Ghosts of Chinatown (14 page)

“No, no. Jasmine.”

He tries to reach it but each swing of his arms just goes through her body.

The tortured musician unleashes an unearthly bone-chilling howl. “Nooo!”

Suddenly, the flames are extinguished. The Bible is there—unburned and whole—and so is the living room.

Quivering in fright, Todd pulls out a bottle of Fen Jiu.
Okay, okay. This is the answer.

He quickly unscrews the top off. His eyes tearing, his throat on fire, he grits his teeth and drinks half the bottle.
 

He stands unobtrusively breathing deeply when he hears the metronome beating again—this time evenly and normally.

He is afraid to look in the direction of the sound.

Suddenly, in time with the metronome ticking, a sound appears that is more terrifying than anything else he has heard in his life. It is the sound of a pure child’s voice singing and playing on the piano.

 
“Jesus loves me, this I know.
 

 
For the Bible tells me so.
 

 
Little Ones to him belong.
 

 
They are weak but He is strong.”

The innocuous children’s song is unnerving. Todd slowly rotates his head to see a cute four-year-old Eurasian girl at the piano.

“Yes, Jesus loves me.
 

 
Yes Jesus loves me.
 

 
Yes, Jesus loves me.
 

 
The Bible tells me so.”

The girl stands on the piano chair and stops the metronome. She jumps off the chair, curtsies and smiles at Todd. “Hi, Daddy. Did you like my singing?”
 

“What did you call me?”

“Don’t be silly. You’re my daddy.”
 

It’s a lightning bolt that hits Todd.
I’m a father! Jasmine…

He wraps his arms around the little girl and kisses her over and over again. “Omigod, omigod, omigod.”

He looks at her face. “You’re gorgeous. You’re fabulous.”

“Thank you, Daddy.”

“What’s your name?”

“It’s Mei-Mei. It means ‘pretty’ or it can mean ‘little sister.’”
 

“I know it does, Mei-Mei.”
 

“Do you like it?”

“I love it. It’s a wonderful name.”

“Can you play with me sometime, Daddy?”

“What do you want to play?”

Mei-Mei looks to the kitchen. The child’s ball rolls in and Mei-Mei picks it up.
 

“I want to play with this. I’ve been rolling it to you but you never do anything.”

Todd recognizes the ball.
That was you!
 

“How long have you lived here, Mei-mei?”

“All my life. Didn’t you know that?”

“Not really but it makes sense.”

“I wish I could stay all the time with Mommy but sometimes she goes away and I don’t know where. She says she’s looking for you. Are you lost, Daddy?”

“Not anymore, Mei-mei. Not anymore.”

Mei-Mei races to Jasmine, who has been watching at the side.

Todd looks sadly at mother and daughter. “She’s what you wanted to talk about that day. Mei-Mei was the secret that you were going to reveal.”

“Yes, and she is the reason that we are here now. So you can know what you did was more than to hurt me.”

The child is suddenly afraid and angry and holds Jasmine close to her.

“I saw you hitting Mommy. You hit her really hard. You’re a bad man, Daddy. Why did you hit Mommy?”

“I… I didn’t…”

“Yes, you did and it hurt. It really hurt.”

Mei-Mei lifts up her blouse to reveal a torso full of ugly dark bruises.

No. How? Of course.

Jasmine jumps in. “She was barely a month old in my womb when you murdered us. If it had only been me, I could forgive, I could forget. But we had a child, Todd, our precious little baby.”

“You told me to make it real. I would never have gone along with that crazy idea if I knew.”
 

Vicky’s voice is heard. “Really? I doubt it.”
 

Todd whips around and sees Vicky, Angela, Liang and Susan standing at the door.
 

Vicky stares at Todd coldly. “Hello, Todd.”

“You’ve been avoiding me, Vicky.”

“For good reason too. I saw what happened to Jasmine and I didn’t want that to happen to me.”

“I didn’t do anything wrong.”

“Stop lying. Stop being in denial. It’s because Jasmine was pregnant that you slaughtered her. You weren’t ready to be a father.”

“Bastard. You killed my sister and my niece.” Angela hits Todd in the face, knocking him to the floor. Blood trickles from Todd’s mouth as Angela continues. “The dead can’t eat, drink, take a crap so...”

Sweat dribbles from Todd’s forehead onto the floor as he struggles to his knees.

... it’s the living you got to worry about.” Angela picks up Todd and throws him like a rocket launcher against the wall.

“You’ve got it all wrong.”

Vicky snarls, “Do I? Like your dad? Or the priest? Or God? Don’t try to convince any of us that you wanted to be a father.”

“It’s different if it’s your own kid.”

“Yes, it is,” says Liang solemnly. “And if you had a father’s heart, you would understand me.”

 
“I do understand.” Head spinning, Todd crawls into the kitchen and pulls himself up to the kitchen counter as his audience amusedly watches.

Todd reaches for the nitroglycerine pills but Vicky picks up the bottle just as his hand is about to grab it. “Please, Vicky.”

“You have the gall to ask for mercy,” Liang thunders.”

Vicky unscrews the lid of the bottle. “He needed this every time we had sex. Guess I was too much for you, Todd?” She pours the pills down the sink as Todd collapses back to his knees.

The end seems more imminent than ever.
 

Todd gasps. “Jasmine, go back to that day. Relive it. For me. For us.”

“Why, Todd? Everything points only to you.”

Todd grabs a bottle of Fen Jiu and chugs it, infuriating Liang.
 

“What kind of man are you? Drowning your sorrows? Obliterating the past?”

“I’m going for the truth.” Head starting to hum, Todd fixes his eyes on Susan. “You told me Fen Jiu is special. That it has power. I hate it but I’ve been drinking it hoping to find out that it was me who did it. Then we’d all have answers. I want the truth too.”

Liang takes the bottle and smashes it on the floor. “You’re an even bigger idiot than I thought.”

Susan shakes her head, listening to the pathetic Todd. “Foolish, stupid boy. There is no such thing as Fen Jiu.”

Liang snorts. “I mixed some scotch, some rum and some leftover brandy together, then added ginseng and soya sauce. That’s Fen Jiu.”

“Don’t you have the slightest doubt, Jasmine? If not for me, how about our daughter? Do you want her to believe her father is a murderer?”

“You are a murderer!” thunders Liang.

“Let Jasmine speak, not you, Liang,” pleads Todd. “Do you? Do you? Listen to your heart, your inner voice. I know it’s telling you something.”

Anguished moments of turmoil as Jasmine deliberates.
I hate myself. It makes no sense that he didn’t do it. Am I that crazy, am I that stupid, am I still so much in love that I will grasp at the air, hoping, praying that it wasn’t him?

The air weighs heavy, then sighs. Love outweighs reason, again.

Jasmine forces a whisper. “What do you want me to do?”
 

Todd’s trembling so hard that he can hardly speak. But he’s got to. This is his last chance.

“You’re back in the twilight. The netherworld between life and death.” Todd’s chest constricts as he writhes and foams at the mouth. “Do you understand, Jasmine? Are you really ready for this?”

“Yes.”

“Flow with me, Jasmine.” He pulls her gently down to the floor and she is in the same position as she was...

... on the smoky stage in Beijing.

Jasmine lies still as Todd hovers over her. “Jasmine! Jasmine!”

Todd lifts her gently but Jasmine remains motionless. “Please God.”

He gently puts her down and listens to her chest. “Damn. Damn.”

He feels her for a pulse but there is none. “Oh no, no, no!”

He dashes out of the room, leaving Jasmine…

… on the kitchen floor, lying there deathly still. Todd leans over her as Angela tries to pull him off.

“That’s when you ran away.”

Todd fights off Angela, refusing to allow himself to be moved off Jasmine.

“No, that’s when I went for help, dammit. Fight it, Jasmine.”

Jasmine whimpers.
 

“I can’t. Darkness... light fading, fading... I’m floating… There’s a rainbow… I can touch it…”

Jasmine’s body suddenly convulses, moving so violently that Todd lets go of her. She is still.
 

Todd kneels beside her. “Is that it, Jasmine? Is that it?”

All are quiet as they look at Jasmine’s body. Susan begins crying.

Todd’s guilt fills the room. The answer is obvious.

Todd’s eyes lower. “You were right. You were all right. It was me who killed you and our baby. I’m sorry, Jasmine. I accept responsibility and… I accept punishment. ”
 

Todd scans the faces of Susan, then Angela, then Liang. “Death is easy, justice is hard. It’s time for justice.”

Liang’s eyes direct themselves to Angela’s. “Get ready.”

Angela nods, then leaves the room.

***

There’s a morbid fascination in watching an execution. Emotions churn, positively and negatively, but one factor overrides. Different cultures call it different things but the principle remains constant. It’s the law of the Hebrews. The law of the universe. Lex talionis. The Code of Hammurabi. An eye for an eye.

Angela re-enters, carrying the metronome. She says sharply to Todd, “Kneel.”

Liang smiles as he walks by her. “Very clever.”

“I thought it would be poetic justice. Use what killed Jasmine on her killer.”
 

Again Angela says to Todd, “Kneel.”

Eternity is in Todd’s eyes as he drops his knees to the floor.
 

Angela hovers menacingly over Todd. “You know why I chose the name Angela? It’s because I am going to be your angel of death.”

She pulls the metronome as far back as she can and then from the floor, Jasmine suddenly whispers, “Wait. I see something.”

It’s too late because Angela’s hand is crashing down towards Todd. Liang whips his arm quickly, pushing Angela’s hand away a split second before the metronome lands on Todd.

“There’s more,” gasps Jasmine.

Jasmine lies still. She says nothing, cannot move but sees images that are distorted, indistinct, fading...
 

And then Catherine comes into view, moving in and out of focus.
 

“I see my sister. Hi, Catherine. I have a vision her bringing a long-stemmed red rose for me. She was so sweet. Thank you, Catherine.”

Angela is kneeling over Jasmine now in the kitchen.

“Thank you, Catherine.”

Todd’s mouth opens. He looks at Angela, then to Jasmine. “That rose wasn’t for you. It was for me! She gave it to me!”

“You lie. How dare you accuse me?”

Todd pulls himself off the floor. He teeters to the living room and pulls out the rose from inside the piano.
 

Tightness grips his chest and his face scrunches in pain. He waves the rose as he staggers back to the kitchen for all to see. “That’s the same rose you carried on the stairway.”
 

As Todd untangles himself from Catherine on the stairway, she hands him a long-stemmed red rose.

“I brought this for you.”

“Thanks.” Taking it while paying only scant attention to her, Todd gets up.

“Gotta go, gotta go.”
 

“Where you going, Todd?”

Todd pummels down the stairs, two, three steps at a time.

Almost tripping, he drops the flower to grab the railing.

He leaves rose lying there as he steadies himself, reaches the exit and rockets out.

The lonely rose on the stairway becomes…

… from Jasmine’s position on the stage... the flash of red coming straight at her.
 

Jasmine sees Catherine’s face as Catherine, holding the rose in her hands, delivers a double-fisted blow onto her face.

Then all goes dark.

Jasmine jolts upright and stares at Angela. “Angela! It was you who killed me!”

Angela backs away toward the door like a cornered snake full of poison.

“Why? Why?”

“Why? You ask why?” Angela, hatred burning, lashes out as Todd lies on the floor, inhaling and exhaling with short labored breaths. “It’s because I hate you. I hate all of you. I hated China and everything about it. I hated not knowing anybody, not being able to speak the language, having to eat the crappy food, having to squat to pee, having to leave my home...” She attacks Liang, “... for him. You were never my father. All you cared about was Jasmine.”

Susan implores, “No, Catherine.”

“Stop calling me that. I hate it. I hate Catherine. I am Angela.”

“You’re my daughter. You’ll always be Catherine to me.”

Liang tries to convince the angry girl. “We loved you. We sacrificed so you could have piano lessons.”

“Oh please. Don’t be such a martyr for me. You don’t think I saw that? You wanted me to grovel with gratitude. How do you think that made me feel? And how about when I came back. You didn’t even recognize me. You wanted to shove me out of the door.”

“He didn’t know because I didn’t want him to know,” interjects Susan. “I wanted your change to be so complete that if he”—acknowledging Liang with a nod—“if he didn’t recognize you, Todd would not either.”

“Bull.” Angela turns on Susan. “Why didn’t you stand up for me? I’m your daughter. Why didn’t you do anything for me? You came back to America so that Liang could have a career but you forgot about me.”