Authors: Stacey Lee
HEADMISTRESS CROUCH RUMMAGES THROUGH a crate. A sprig of hemlock needles falls on her, and she claws it off. “Fools. What good's a pot without coal?”
I want to continue past her to Ah-Suk, a hundred feet away, but I don't wish to be rude. “Maybe it's not for cooking.”
She shudders, then bends over the crate, which is stuffed with canvas and wood sticks. “What kind of blanket is this?”
“I believe that's a tent, ma'am.”
She looks up at me sharply, then shakes out the canvas. “Obviously it's a tent.”
I'm in no mood for her snippiness, so I move toward a ring of redwoods, passing an iron bench, which has become a makeshift bed for an entire family.
Ah-Suk perches on his supply crate, trying to unstick the clasp of his suitcase. Unlike Tom, who favors his mother's solid build, the doctor has always reminded me of a crane, with a long neck and a deliberateness to his movements.
“Ah-Suk, thank you for bringing me here,” I say in Cantonese. More tears spring to my eyes, but I force them back.
The last time I saw Jack, he was asleep. I should've woken him. I should've told him how much I love him.
“Don't need to thank me.” He beckons me to sit beside him on the crate, and I do.
He continues, “Your ma led a good life. She deserved a five-blossom death.”
I nod, though that particular saying always blew sand in my face. Chinese believe that in order to die well, a woman must have experienced the five “blossoms”âmarriage, bearing a son, being respected, having a grandson who loves you, and dying in your sleep after a long life. To me, Ma's death is no less honorable than someone with five hundred grandsons.
In the distance, the St. Clare's girls are trying to put together tents. Harry and Katie stretch out the canvas, while Francesca tries to fit two sticks together.
“You must burn paper for your mother, and your brother, too.” Ah-Suk makes a sucking sound, and he shakes his head gravely. “Black hair must send white hair first.”
The reminder that parents should not live longer than their children puts a fresh ache in my heart. “I will, Ah-Suk.”
“Your father was out making deliveries?”
“Yes. He would have been coming back from Oakland.”
He pulls off his skullcap to run a hand through his hair, and the gesture immediately reminds me of Tom. I always teased him that he better stop or his hair would grow as thin as Ah-Suk's. “Then he should be fine. Nothing you can do but wait.”
Despite his words, an image of Ba wringing his cap springs to mind, replaced by a worse image of Ba drowning. I take a deep breath, forcing the terrible thought to leave.
“And what of Tom? Do you think he is okay?”
He scowls, and his chin hairs quiver. “Captain Lu's ship can reach twenty-two knots. They should be a few hundred miles up the coast by now.” He returns to trying to open his suitcase. “I would not worry about him, Mercy. He is not coming back. We have both lost family.”
He must feel great shame that his only son has left, though he, like many Chinese, will never admit it. I don't point out the irony of Tom's disobedience, which saved him from this hell. And though I sympathize with Ah-Suk's loss, it cannot equate with the loss I feel for Ma and Jack. Ah-Suk could still go look for Tom, or write him a letter.
The lid of the suitcase finally pops open to reveal his high-shelf tea set padded with packets of herbs.
“I'd packed this to give to Tom for his trip, because sometimes he has trouble sleeping.” His sharp Adam's apple dips as he swallows, and I'm surprised to find his normally strict expression beset by grief. “I didn't realize he meant to leave so soon.” He pulls a folded paper from his jacket and slaps it against his palm. “That's all I get for eighteen years of being his father. One lousy note.”
Despite my loyalty to Tom, I find myself hurting for the old man. I want to assure him that we will see Tom again, but it would be impertinent for me to offer comfort to a respected elder. He shakes his head and snaps the lid back down.
“I sent Winter to Mr. Cruz. I told the fool to lay off the chicken livers, but he prefers his gout,” Ah-Suk says brusquely, changing the subject. He often sent his horse to the Portuguese man's house in Potrero Hill when his leg acted up. Winter was
the smartest horse I ever met, and he always followed Ah-Suk's instructions to the letter.
“May luck go with them. Have you heard word of Ling-Ling and her mother?”
“I have not. One can't be sure. The whole block went up in smoke.”
I envision Ling-Ling's ma trying to hobble away from the flames with her lotus feet, and immediately regret all the unkind thoughts I'd had about her.
I'm struck by the impermanence of it all. You expect certain things to always be there, like the bakery on the corner, or the boy you grew up with. But when the very ground can eat you alive without warning, what's to say the ocean won't dry up? Or the stars won't suddenly shut off? Nothing is forever.
“May we help you with your tent?” I ask.
“Girls should not do men's work,” Ah-Suk says sternly. “Plenty of others to help.” He points his chin toward the river, where two Chinese men are fetching water. “Go back to your white ghosts. Seems they need your help more than me.” He sweeps his hand toward Harry and Katie, who are wrestling the tent as if it were a live animal.
It strikes me that maybe I should stay with Ah-Suk and my countrymen. Where do I belong now? Maybe this is what it feels like to be a hungry ghost, caught in both worlds, trapped in ambivalence. There are only a few dozen Chinese hereâmost probably took shelter closer to Chinatownâbut I recognize them all. Like the three o'clock funeral peddler and the Clay Street barber wearing his basin on his head.
A group of cigar rollers about Tom's age are unfolding a large canvas sheet. I stare at their faces. If only he were here. He would understand the rift in my soul.
Biting my trembling lip, I head back to the girls. They do need me more, like Ah-Suk said.
In addition to the tents and potsâwhich, unless you're a horse, are too large to be chamber potsâeach crate also contains matches and candles, soap and rags, and a short-handled brush, either for brushing hair or washing dishes.
I wish they had thought to include toilet paper, as I am feeling the urge. My eyes catch on someone's comportment book lying in the grass. Of all the things to grab in an emergency. I pick it up and rub one of the pages between my fingers. It's not ideal, but it's better than leaves.
When I return from my visit to the nearest bush, I find that the girls have successfully put up four tents, arranged due north, south, east, and west, with an open space in between for a campfire. Ironically, the number for death is also the number for survival. Something sour coats my tongue. What more can four do? It has taken the very best from me, and no longer do I fear it.
Only ten girls from St. Clare's remain, plus Headmistress Crouch. The old woman claims the tent facing north, assigning Elodie, Minnie Mae, and Georgina to the one opening south. The one facing west goes to three sisters from Boston who are as frail as porcelain teapots. That leaves Harry, Francesca, Katie, and me in the one facing east.
Ma said an eastern-facing door harnesses the sun's rising
energy. My throat swells at the thought that I will never hear her words of wisdom again.
Georgina attempts to coax Minnie Mae into her new home, but she refuses to budge from the spot where she sits hugging herself. “I don't want to stay in that nasty tent. I'm hungry, and cold, and I want to go home. I want to go home!”
Georgina pats her on the back. “
Shh
, now. It won't be forever. Your parents will come soon.” I can't help worrying how Minnie Mae, the weaker of the twins, will survive without Ruby by her side. “Have you ever gone camping? It's like that.”
“Stop it,” Minnie Mae says, shrugging off Georgina. Her eyes are half-wild, and her hair hangs in greasy curtains around her shoulders. “You're lying to me. Tell me the truth; we're going to die!”
“Yes. The truth is, we are going to die.” Minnie Mae's mouth unsticks, and Georgina adds, “But not today.”
She would make a good midwife with her sturdy arms and no-fuss ways.
“We need to build a fire,” I think aloud.
Headmistress Crouch looks up from testing the coarseness of a brush on her palm. “How? For God's sake, every emergency kit should come with a stove. This isn't the nineteenth century.”
Who knew it was possible for her to be even grouchier than normal?
“We can make one,” I say.
“How?” Francesca echoes.
Katie sits on a turned-over crate and rubs her nose, smearing
black soot over it. “Put a bunch of sticks together and light it, like when you're roasting apples on a stick.”
“And burn up Golden Gate Park while we're at it? No, thanks. We have enough fires as it is.” Georgina stares off into the eastern sky, which is thick with smoke.
What would Tom do? He'd make a stove out of whatever he had on hand. We could build a fire in two of the pots, but then we wouldn't have them for cooking or water.
I think back to the neighborhoods I passed on the way here. Many of the crumbled houses were brick. Bricks make excellent fireplaces. Back in Chinatown, we used a brick stove for cooking the community soup in the courtyard.
“I will make us a stove,” I hear myself say. Everyone looks at me.
In her chapter on productivity, Mrs. Lowry said that industry can get you through the hardest days. I must simply keep myself busy until Ba finds me. Anything is better than waiting in this clearing, where the sound of Minnie Mae's crying sticks little needles into my skin.
The closer I am to someone's grief, the closer I feel to my own. And that is a place with no doors and no windows. No escape at all.
ââWE NEED SOMETHING TO CARRY THE BRICKS.''
Katie looks down at her perch. “We have the crates.”
I nod, considering, but carrying them full would be awkward. In Chinatown, men carried heavy loads on
daam tiu
. Maybe we can do the same. I eye our newly constructed sleeping quarters. “Let's take down our tent.”
Katie gapes, showing the space between her teeth. “But we got it up not five minâ”
“Do it,” says Francesca, a warning in her voice.
“All right,” says Katie.
After we pull down the tent, we disassemble the sticks and poke the two halves through either side of one crate, forming carry poles. Katie and Harry do the same with another crate. Using rags, I cushion the contact between the poles and crates, like we do with the
daam tiu
, to distribute weight so the poles don't snap. Then I show the girls how to fold their shawls to cushion their shoulders, too. The Boston sisters watch us, their teapot faces awash with apprehension.
Elodie hasn't moved an inch from her pine tree. I say to no one in particular, “If any feel inclined to collect firewood while we are away, that would be very helpful.”
Headmistress Crouch surveys our activity while hunched over her cane, lips puckered in disapproval. “What if there are bandits? The place is in chaos. Young ladies walking about, unattended
 . . .”
“We have nothing to steal. Only our hair.” Katie considers her auburn strands.
Harry scratches her leg with her other foot, looking uneasy.
Headmistress Crouch stamps her cane, sending up a cloud of dirt. “It is not your
hair
I am worried about,” she says through clenched teeth. The pouches under her eyes look especially prominent. “The city is full of desperate men. Who knows what could happen.”
“We won't survive long without fire for heat and boiling water. I'll take one of these.” I retrieve a brush from one of the crates and stick it in my waistband.
Katie says out of the side of her mouth, “If they take our hair, we can brush it for them first.”
I didn't think I would ever smile again, but one wants out. Before it escapes, I lead us over freshly cut grass to a stone-lined pathway. I can tell by how the shadows fall that it must be three or four o'clock, not as late as the gray skies might suggest.
A group of Irish refugees are busy digging holes in the ground. I shudder to think of what, or who, they could be burying. Farther away, a congregation of Spaniards kneel with their heads bowed, and a hundred paces beyond them, several Negroes are erecting some sort of lean-to with crates.
And so, the neighborhoods are built.
We continue to the eastern edge of the park, where a dozen
or so people have gathered around a table. We angle for a better look.
Francesca, the tallest of us, stands on her toes. “They're looking at a book.”
I put down my end of the crate. “Harry and Katie, you stay here.”
Francesca and I thread our way into the crowd, and a woman in a stovepipe bonnet asks, “You have someone to report?”
“Report?”
“Missing, deceased, or found.”
“Oh. Well, yes.”
She hands me a book, and a shaved pencil. “The names are listed alphabetically. Indicate status with
M
,
D
, or
F
, and add your location so they know where to find you.”
I look for Ma, Ba, Jack, and Tom, but there are no entries under any of their names. Francesca and I write down everyone we can think of at St. Clare's. I add entries for my family, and for Ah-Suk and Tom, including their Chinese names, in case anyone's looking for them. I turn to follow Francesca back to the others, but at the last minute, I remember another entry.
“One more, please,” I tell the woman.
She gives me back the book, and I write
Madame Du Lac, D
. Then I hand it back to her. “There are people near Alvord Lake who I am sure would like to know about these books.”
Her bonnet wags up and down. “I will see to them.”
May the news fall as gentle as snow on Elodie.
Collecting Harry and Katie, we march to the edge of the park. Francesca briefs the girls on the Missing People Books.
The path leads us a few hundred more feet to the mouth of Haight Street. On the flat corridor, the cable car tracks run straight to Market, then up to the Ferry Building. But the cars are tucked away in their barn, probably for a long sleep. We step over debris, following the tracks. Seven thousand dollars used to buy one of the attractive Queen Anne homes here. Who knows what they're worth now, or what anything in this city is worth, for that matter?
Maybe no one will want to live here anymore, with the ground so shaky. Maybe even the houses on Nob Hill will go for a song. The notion that I could afford such a residence now that Ma and Jack will never need walls around them again cuts me deeply. Jack will never need to work at Ba's shop, so I no longer need a business. I am empty of purpose, like the kite without its string.
Before tears come, I distract myself by looking outward. Most of these Victorian houses seem to have suffered no more than broken windows and busted “frills.” The street reminds me of a clothesline of tattered dresses the day after a rousing party. Despite their intact homes, residents camp out on their front porches, some wailing, some talking, some sitting in silence. It's hard for anyone to trust the roof at this point. An elderly woman watches men pull a velvet sofa from her front window. If the apocalypse has come, might as well have somewhere comfortable to sit outdoors.
The wail of a siren threads the background, and plumes of smoke fan out across the skyline, some diffuse, others still sharp, as if drawn by charcoal.
I wonder how long it will take Ba to find me. Assuming his
ferry arrived, it will be difficult to cross town with all the fires and traffic. He'll be thirsty and tired. Will he remember the emergency location? It might be days, even weeks, before we find each other.
We stop for Harry, who wipes her foggy glasses. “It's so sad, all these people. What will become of us?”
“I told you, Harry, you can live with Gran and me. She's got enough bedrooms to sleep in a different one every night of the week.”
Harry picks up her end, and we start moving again. “One day we're all swimming in the same pond, and the next we're dumped into the ocean.”
“Living in Texas is much better than living in the ocean.”
“I'll miss living in San Francisco,” says Harry. “This feels like home.”
Normally, this time of day is cool enough to keep a cod outside, but the temperature of the city seems to have risen by several degrees, and the air wraps around me like a thick blanket. I've become numb to the stench of burning wood, but the particles still make me cough.
“Not going to be much of a home when everything is burned,” Katie says gravely.
“Don't say that,” says Francesca. “They'll get the fires put out.”
At that moment, a team of horses blazes past, pulling a fire engine with a shiny chrome steamer that bounces and jostles along the uneven road.
“Dear Lord,” breathes Francesca. “I hope that's the last of
the shaking. Every time a wagon goes by, I want to jump out of my skin.”
Katie swerves to avoid a buckled paving stone. “We overheard some conversations when you were at the Missing People Books. They said the water mains were busted, and that firemen were bringing water from boats to load the steamers.”
We approach a storefront with the words
Gil's Grocery
painted in green letters on the awning. The second story looks ready to collapse, its ceiling bulging dangerously low. As we pass, we peer into the broken windows, all of us probably thinking the same thing. The sight of cans and dried goods makes my stomach rumble. Even my hunger saddens meâa reminder that I still must live, while Jack and Ma cannot. For the first time in my life, I wish the dead did return as ghosts, for then I could see them again.
“It's too dangerous,” says Francesca as if sensing my thoughts. “That ceiling is about to collapse.”
“Yeah, one sneeze would change that bi-level into a flat,” says Katie.
We keep moving and soon come to a house that has been reduced to a mountain of bricks. “Here's good,” I tell them. “Doesn't look like anyone's home.”
Katie glances around. “I hope they don't mind us taking their bricks.”
I perch on an uprooted tree to dislodge a pebble from my boot. “I hope they're not lying dead under their bricks.”
Harry shudders. “Oh, that would be dreadful.”
Francesca pushes a hard chunk with her toe. “Are you sure we should be doing this? I don't want to get in trouble.”
“Think of it this way. They've got to clear out all these bricks to rebuild. We're doing them a favor.”
Katie picks up an unbroken block. “Makes sense to me.”
We load the bricks into our crates. People hurry by on foot, hoof, or wheel, but no one calls out our looting. It's just junk now, anyway.
On the way back, we pass Gil's Grocery again. I stop, and since I'm in the front, the other girls stop, too. “I would hate for all that food to go to waste.”
Katie moans. “I think my stomach's digesting itself.”
Francesca tries to lift our crate again, but I don't pick up my end. She sighs. “It's hardly worth risking your life over.”
I silently disagree. For some reason I can't explain, I want to take that risk, thumb my nose at fate, even though it's as foolhardy as running barefoot through a glass shop. “The ceiling hasn't fallen yet.”
Harry shifts from foot to foot as I study the grocery more closely. The door has come off its hinges. Cans litter the floor, along with broken crates and squashed produce. Cooking utensils dangle from a ceiling rack that looks dangerously close to snapping off completely.
“Don't do it,” says Francesca. “It'd be stealing.”
“And taking sassafras and bricks isn't? We wouldn't take it if we didn't absolutely need it. We'll pay them one day.”
She chews on her lip, knowing she can't stop me.
“I will be fast, I promise.” I consider telling her what I want on my headstone, too, just in case, but decide that would not help instill confidence.
I gingerly approach the doorway and, when nothing happens, step inside. The dust makes a cough build in me. I try to hold it in, but I can't, and out it comes with the force of a cough denied.
When my eyes have cleared, I check for any sign of movement, and seeing none, quickly gather supplies into my arms. Pasta, olive oil, bacon. I also lift a bag of rice, and a yellow can of creamed corn, because I always wondered what that was, exactly. At the last minute, I grab a box of salt and a large spoon.
As I lift the spoon from the ceiling rack, I hear a creaking from somewhere above. A bolt of panic shoots through me.
Fly, foolish girl, fly!
I leap out the door, spilling groceries everywhere. The girls are yelling at me. I roll and roll, like I'm the world's last sausage that a pack of dogs just caught wind of.
Hands lift me up and hold me steady. Someone slaps dirt off me. I heave in giant gulps of air, giddy and sick all at once. With a last groan as if to say
I can't hold it anymore
, the second story of Gil's Grocery crushes the first, releasing plumes of dust that fan out to the other side of the street.
No one speaks for a moment. Clouds of powder rise off the store, now a twisted heap of wood and splinters. A breathless sense of exhilaration wings through me. Cheating death makes me feel invincible, as if I could step off a roof and the sky would catch me.
Don't you get too greedy, Death. You already have taken more than your fair share today. You can't have me yet.
The four of us look like a box of sugared doughnuts. The only parts not covered by a layer of dust are our eyeballs. Harry
peels off her glasses, revealing a swath of skin in the shape of her spectacles.
Somehow I managed to hang on to the yellow can. I blow dust off it. “Well, this creamed corn better be worth it.”
Francesca floats a feather of a smile. It's contagious in the way smiles can be, and after a few snorts, we're all holding our sides, laughing.
The rice has spilled from the bag, but we salvage what we can. Katie scoops handfuls off the ground, taking along pebbles and dirt. “My gran makes the best creamed corn in Texas, maybe the country. She said if I ever touched the canned kind, she would know and the angels would weep.”
“We make polenta at the restaurant, which is a hundred times better than that canned stuff.” Francesca sacrifices one of her hairpins to cinch the bag of rice closed.
I sweep up my nose. “Well, you ungrateful souls, I guess I will have it all to myself, then.”
Katie laughs. “You won't get very far without a can opener.”
We distribute the remaining groceries into the crates, then lift them onto our shoulders to begin the trek back to the park.
The crates are heavy, and we must stop often to catch our breath. I pinch my shoulders, which are bruising where the poles rub them.
An explosion comes from somewhere behind us, so deep and booming that it rumbles through my soles. In the distance, a black cloud roils toward the heavens, blocking out what remains of the sun. We stare at the conflagration, all lightheartedness forgotten.
“God save us,” murmurs Francesca. “It's like hell on earth here.”
Harry whimpers, and Katie squeezes her around the shoulders.
“What if it never stops?” Harry says in a shaky voice.
“Mr. Mortimer used to say, âIt is only in darkness that one finds light.'” It was one of his platitudes, but it always seemed to comfort the mourners.
We pack up again. I keep my eyes open for Ba, as if he might come strolling through this very street at any minute. I don't see him, but I do see plenty of men who could be him, with their stooped shoulders and shuffling gaits. Dust covers everyone, concealing skin color and making everyone's eyes look haunted.