Beijing Comrades (31 page)

He turned onto his side and pressed his back up against my chest. “Yeah,” he said. “I'd love a little endurance. Endurance for more than two days before breaking up with me!” He laughed.

I propped myself up on an elbow and peered over his shoulder. I wanted to catch a glimpse of his eyes, which I hoped would tell me why he had just made this flippant remark. But his eyes were closed.

“You know, they say it's hard for people like us to stay together,” he said out of nowhere.

Pulling the blanket up tightly around us, I kissed the nape of his neck. “It's been almost ten years,” I said. “Well, on and off,” I added. “You don't think that's a long time?”

Lan Yu turned around to face me, wrapping his arms around my neck and kissing me deeply. “I want more!” he said, resting his forehead against mine.

Then let's do it, I thought.

After my reconciliation with Lan Yu, Annie continued calling me periodically. After the second time we slept together, I was
even beginning to think that the little fairy might be able to move this mere mortal's heart. But by the third time I saw him, it was becoming clear that he just wasn't doing it for me. Annie sensed it, too. The last time we got together he bitched endlessly that there wasn't one good man on the planet. Then he stopped calling.

Thirty-Eight

My mother's sixty-third birthday was on the twelfth day of the sixth lunar month. Everyone forgot about it, including me.

Aidong and her husband were always swamped with summer orders that time of year—they ran a flower distribution company—and Jingdong had recently moved to Australia with her husband and daughter. On the morning of my mother's birthday, the old lady called to ask me to visit her in the evening, but it was only when I got there that Auntie Xiao, my mother's maid, pulled me into the hallway to remind me in a hushed and somewhat flustered voice what day it was. Auntie Xiao wasn't my real aunt, we just called her that.

It was too late to go back in time and wish my mother a happy birthday, so I gave myself a mood adjustment and tried to think creatively about last-minute ways to do something nice for her. I walked into the kitchen and grabbed her by both hands. “Let's go out to dinner!” I said excitedly. Any restaurant, I knew, would have a little birthday routine for elderly folks that they could do. But my mother wasn't having it.

“Oh, it's okay, Little Dong!” she exclaimed. “Auntie Xiao is making
sau mein
!” Sau mein, longevity noodles, were a birthday tradition for old people. More than enough to make my mother happy on her birthday.

“Well, where's Aidong then?” I asked in a huff. “I'm going to call her and tell her to get her butt over here!” I picked up the clunky beige rotary telephone my mother kept on the table next to the couch.

“Don't!” my mother screeched, rushing toward me to grab the phone out of my hands. “She's busy today! I already talked to her!”

“What on earth can be so important that she has to miss your sixty-third birthday?” I protested. “Don't worry, Ma. I'll just give her a quick call.” It was just the opportunity I needed to show her I'd remembered her special day.

“Chen Handong, you listen to your mother,” she said in a stern voice. “Aidong is so busy right now she doesn't even have time for her own kids, let alone me. Besides, she already stopped by yesterday with the loveliest presents. You have to see what she brought!”

I hung up the phone, fighting the urge to lower my head in shame. I knew my mother hadn't mentioned Aidong's gifts to make me feel bad, but I felt like an ass for showing up empty-handed.

“Anyway,” she continued. “As long as you're here, I'm happy. You know the door is always open for you.” She trailed behind me as I crossed the kitchen carrying a heavy pot of water she had asked me to place on the stove. “And don't wait for me to pick up the phone and call before you come over here,” she continued. “You and Lin Ping used to visit every weekend, remember?” I placed the pot of water on the burner, and Auntie Xiao took over.

“And if you don't want to come alone, there's always room for two.”

If I had still been holding the pot of water, I would have dropped it. Did she just say what I think she said? Astonished, I turned to look at her, but she was already at the kitchen sink with her back to me, calmly washing a bowl of dried black mushrooms, seemingly oblivious to the vortex of emotions into which her words had thrown me.

My professional life wasn't improving and was, in fact, deteriorating with each passing day. Upticks happened here and there, and money flowed periodically into my bank account, but it was nowhere near the great bounce back for which I had hoped. Apart from nights when I had business-related social engagements that kept me away, I stayed with Lan Yu at Fang Village, where our life had become routine to say the least. Each day after work I came home, took a shower, then napped until he got off work. Then we would either go out to eat or make something simple at home. After several months of living together in this way, we settled into a routine that was not so much happy as it was practical. The comfortable monotony of our day-to-day existence left us with some much-needed peace of mind.

One warm and beautiful Sunday afternoon, Lan Yu jumped into my arms, giddy with excitement. He said he wanted to go outside and enjoy the sunshine. I felt like crap because I hadn't slept well the night before, but agreed—“As long as you drive,” I had said—and asked him where he wanted to go.

“Heaven!” he shouted. He wanted to be in a place that was outdoors but isolated, a place where we could be alone, where we could actually express our affection for each other. A place where we could, for once in our lives, be like any other couple.
Until that day, I had never thought such a place existed.

“Watch out!” he threatened with a laugh. “I'm going to hold your hand in public!”

We got into the car and drove toward the Western Hills. Lan Yu was so excited about our getaway that he practically bounced up and down in his seat as he drove. Turning to look at me, he laughed when he saw I couldn't stop yawning. “Come on, wake up!” he said cheerfully, placing his hand on the back of my neck and giving it a gentle squeeze.

“I'm an old man, leave me alone!” I joked. “I need you to wake me up. Sing a song or something.”

“A song!” he exclaimed. “What do you want to sing?” He stared at the road in fixed concentration, evidently trying to come up with something. Then his eyes lit up and he took a deep breath.

“
March on! March on! Our troops march toward the sun! On the motherland's soil we step, on the motherland's soil we run!”

Lan Yu didn't have to tell me what he was singing. It was “The March of the Chinese People's Liberation Army,” a military anthem that had been around in various forms since the 1930s. I took the next line.

“
The hope of our people is on our backs, an invincible force are we!”

I held Lan Yu's hand tightly against my knee. The car rolled forward and we began to sing in unison.

“
March on! March on! Our troops march toward the sun! To the victory of the revolution, and the entire nation's liberation!”

We fell into peals of laughter. Never had a song felt so good.

We parked and walked into a secluded area of the Western Hills, hoping to avoid the judgmental eyes of the very Chinese masses we had been extolling in song just moments earlier.

We stumbled upon a beautiful clearing with shady trees and a cool, gentle wind. I sat up against a tree and Lan Yu lay down with his head resting in my lap. He looked up at the sky, his countenance betraying that he was lost in a faraway dreamworld.

“I don't know why,” he began, “but the sky has always seemed so much bluer here in Beijing. Bluer than it ever was in my hometown.”

I smiled down at him. “I'll bet the sky is even bluer in America. No wonder you want to go there: you're a blue sky yourself!” It was true. Lan meant
blue
and Yu meant
sky.

He smiled and looked up at me. “You probably think the moon is fuller in America, too, don't you?” His voice floated upward like birdsong.

“Hey!” I said, craning my neck down to kiss his nose. “You're the one who's always bitching and moaning about how you want to go there!” I laughed.

“What do you mean, bitching and moaning? If I ever left Beijing, it would only be because I had no choice.”

“What do you mean, no choice?”

He paused, gazing at the trees overhead. Then he returned his eyes to mine. “Listen, Handong. I would never leave Beijing unless you broke up with me. But if you did, I would leave forever. I would never come back.” His tone of voice was dead serious. I looked up at the trees, where I saw two little red birds flutter downward and land on a branch.

“Anyway,” he continued, “I was just thinking about that. Why don't we go there together? Just you and me. What do you think?”

I looked back down at him. “I like visiting the US, but I don't want to live there.” Lan Yu became quiet, but raised himself slightly so that he was now snuggled up against my chest.
”Speaking of which,” I continued, “did you get everything worked out with your schools?”

“I got two fellowships, but not from very good universities.”

“So, are you going to take one of them?” I asked, trying to conceal my sudden alarm.

Lan Yu returned his gaze to the blue sky overhead. “I never called that friend of yours about the visa,” he said. “Anyway, who cares? I like Beijing!”

In the distance we heard the jarring sound of human voices. “Someone's coming!” I panicked. “Get up!”

Lan Yu kept his head firmly in my lap. “What are you so afraid of?” he asked. “Let them come. Whoever it is, they won't stand a chance with me!”

“What if it's two people?” I asked.

“Don't I have you here with me?”

“And if it's three?”

“Three of
them
aren't necessarily stronger than the two of
us
.” He laughed.

“Well, what if it's a whole bunch of people?”

“So we get our heads cracked open!” he said. “I'll fight them to the death if I have to!” Smiling, I recalled what Zhang Jie had told me about Lan Yu's fight with Yonghong:
That little guy of yours is tough as nails.

“Okay, tough guy,” I said, my eyes fixed on his smiling face. “Huada would be proud to call you a graduate!”

I looked at the sky reflected in his eyes: deep, dark, almost black. I admired him so much. He possessed a kind of bravery I would never have. When I looked at his face, I saw not just a handsome young man but the breathtaking power of youth itself.

Lan Yu sat up and I pulled him into my arms. There we sat, our lips pressed together with the fervent madness of a
first-time kiss. In nearly a decade of knowing him, it was only the second time we had ever shared a kiss outdoors. But now, instead of darkness, we were surrounded by radiant sunlight, blue skies, and the beautiful, rolling hills around us.

Thirty-Nine

Autumn! Once again the stunning, golden autumn of Beijing had arrived. The air was cool and dry, and the sky peeking through the tree branches was exceptionally blue. It was as if the sky was trying to tell the world that something had changed—or was about to. Leaves fluttered and fell to the ash-colored streets below. The roads were usually so broad and barren, but in autumn they always came alive with a thick carpet of color.

Early one morning—
that
morning—I woke up in Lan Yu's little apartment in Fang Village to a spray of sunshine bursting through the bedroom window. I moaned softly, loving the warmth on my face, the way it made up for the failure of the endlessly incompetent heater in the corner to dispel the cold of the night before. A few minutes later, Lan Yu woke up and we languished in bed for a while before getting up for work. I had an early meeting to get to and Lan Yu had a deadline to make. He jumped out of bed and threw on his favorite white shirt, the one he'd worn that day at Tian'anmen, then washed his hands and face. It was time for us to commence our separate, equally busy lives.

Just before stepping out the door, Lan Yu leaned up against me to give me a kiss goodbye. Gently pinching the lapel of my suit jacket between his fingers, he held my tie with his other hand and pulled me toward him. I was feeling rushed, so I planted a perfunctory kiss on his nose and asked him if he needed a ride to work.

“I'm going to take a cab,” he replied, “but can you pick me up when I get off?”

“Of course!” I grabbed my briefcase. “See you at five!”

I made it to my meeting on time, but kicked myself for forgetting my cell. It didn't matter anyway. The negotiations went well, and I was going to make a killing from the deal.

Driving back to my office, I started planning a trip to Europe. The list of countries floated through my mind: Germany, the Netherlands, Denmark—including, of course, a visit to Tivoli Gardens. I smiled thinking about how much Lan Yu would enjoy seeing the historic buildings of Northern Europe that he had thus far seen only in pictures.

I stopped at a red light and closed my eyes. I, Chen Handong, will recover from this mess! Success was imminent. I felt it.

But in an instant, everything changed.

I entered my office and a grave-looking Liu Zheng grabbed my arm. “Sit down, Handong.” He pushed down on my shoulders to make me sit on the sofa.

“What is it?” I asked. “You're acting weird.”

“I need you to brace yourself, Handong. I mean, emotionally . . .,” he stammered.

“What the hell are you talking about, Liu Zheng?” I thought something had happened to my mother.

“It's Lan Yu,” he said. “Something happened.”

My mouth fell open. I didn't understand what he meant.

“The taxi he was in, it crashed into a truck. He was—I mean, it happened right there on the spot.”

A hand gripped my elbow and led me outside to the street, where someone put me in a car and took me to a hospital. My mind went numb and it felt as though I were falling through clouds. I looked up and the skyline fused heaven and earth in a vast swath of blue and gray.

When we arrived at the hospital, someone in a white coat took me to a room where beds covered with white sheets lined the walls. We stopped before one of them and someone, I don't know who, lifted the sheet.

There I saw a face: red, blue, black. My knees swayed and I lowered myself to the ground—it was Lan Yu. I reached up and grasped his shoulders, the shoulders I had touched so many times. But they were stiff now, cold. My eyes dug into him; he had seen my eyes a thousand times, but could no longer return their gaze. I looked at the high bridge of his nose, his red lips, his dark brown eyes, eyes I had lost myself in countless times. And suddenly, I laughed! It didn't matter that his face was covered with a thick coating of black and red blood. It was Lan Yu! I didn't need to see him clearly to know it. I held him with all the strength that I had.

Someone tried to pull me away. I struggled to free myself, then collapsed on top of the man lying before me. A sound came out of my mouth. It was a cry of anguish, of two invisible hands squeezing my throat.

“Calm down, Handong!” Someone grabbed my arm as if to pull me away and my head surged with anger.

Get off me! the words swirled in my mind.

Someone, something, pulled at me harder, pulled me away from him.

Fuck you! You want to laugh? Laugh! But I won't leave him! He needs me! He's safe in my arms!

I tugged at Lan Yu's arm, pulled him toward me, wanted to feel his body melt into mine.

Because he's not dead! He told me to pick him up, he told me to kiss him goodbye! He never does that! He was trying to tell me something, but I didn't hear him! I didn't give him a good kiss goodbye! How could I have been so stupid?

I kissed the twisted, red-and-black flesh before me, and my own face became smeared with blood. I gave him a final kiss. A good kiss this time. The right kiss this time.

I don't know how long it took, but a powerful force finally pulled me away. They led me out of the room, I don't know where to. I wanted to stay with him, but I couldn't. I was powerless.