Petals from the Sky (17 page)

Right then, our “waitress” came back to ask whether we wanted anything more. As I was thinking, I noticed her nails were long, tapered, and painted crimson. I tried to look at her neck to see whether she had an Adam’s apple. But no luck. She was wearing a spiked leather choker.

Her husky, high-pitched voice slithered its way into my ears. “Honey, anything more I can get you?”

“Hmm…” I didn’t want anything else; I only wanted to study “her.”

She flashed a derisive grin that emphasized her bloodred, full lips, her long-lashed eyes ping-ponging between Lisa and me. “Let me help you. Hmm…what about some dessert? We have cheesecake, Sacher torte, tiramisu….” She kissed her fingers and made aloud smack; the gloss of her fingernails gave out a few sparks in the faint light. “So, sweetie”—she turned to me—“what d’you want?”

“Hmm…” I looked at Lisa, then back at the “waitress,” speechless.

She knelt down, put her elbow on our table, then rested her chin on her hand. She blinked several times as if her eyes were really itchy now. Anxiously, I half expected her lashes to drop into my Cuba libre.

“So, my China doll?” She winked at Lisa, then stared at me. “You want a minute? I can wait.”

Finally Lisa came to my rescue. “Give her a chocolate mousse, please.”

“Gotcha.” She wagged a finger at Lisa and chuckled flirtatiously. Her silver hippie earrings trembled like virgin breasts savagely squeezed.

She pushed herself up, and her leather-wrapped, narrow bottom wriggled away. I noticed a few holes, big and small, in her fishnet stockings.

I felt an army of ants crawling up my spine. “Lisa, you don’t find this place…weird?”

“Oh, no, I’m an artist, Meng Ning. Nothing surprises me.”

“Even men with breasts who wear dresses and flirt with you?”

“If you look at a thing as it is, it just is. “

“You like men dressed up like women?”

She squinted at me with a curious expression. “I thought I’d expand your horizons. You know, Michael won’t bring you to a place like this. He’s too serious—and too protective of you. I know him well. Sorry, Meng Ning. If you don’t like it here, I can take you somewhere else.”

“No, Lisa. I also like expanding my horizons.” It surprised me that suddenly my voice sounded so loud and vehement.

After more drinks and more talk, I began to feel at ease and got into the rhythm of the bar. Waitresses floated between tables like fish in water; men drank, smoked, cracked jokes, turned heads at passing buttocks, and threw glances at us.

Under the warm light of our table’s gilt brass lamp, Lisa’s skin took on a golden sheen, looking almost translucent. I felt her body emit waves of energy toward me. During our conversations, her eyes sometimes focused intently on me and sometimes far in the distance—darting between men in tight jeans, bomber jackets, and cowboy boots. Judging from the few wrinkles making their debut around her eyes, she was like a flower at its ripest moment of perfection, which was also perilously close to wilting.

Lisa turned back to look at me. “You know, Meng Ning, I’m actually part Chinese. My grandfather was a missionary and met my grandmother in Shanghai. My mother spent her childhood there.”

Now Lisa’s eyes were unreadable, like a cat’s. “I never lived in China, but Mom used to tell me strange tales about her life there.”

“Tell me her tales.”

She made a face. “OK, but don’t blame me if they’re too weird.”

“Go ahead.” I took a big gulp of my Cuba libre.

“One time her parents took her to a zoo where she saw a man talking to a flower—”

“That’s not very strange—”

“Meng Ning, there’re more to the story; would you let me finish?” Lisa feigned annoyance, then continued. “The man was a street performer. He told the audience that every day he had to feed and wash the flower like a person. Just when he was about to demonstrate how, the flower opened up to reveal a pretty girl’s head—”

“Oh.”

“While everyone was exclaiming in wonder, the man stuck a lighted cigarette in her mouth. The girl’s head started to smoke, blowing out clouds of smoke in circles, triangles, squares, even a heart. After that, she went on to perform other tricks, like singing, eating, and making funny faces. Of course everybody tried to look and see whether she was hiding her body somewhere. But all they could see under her head was a stem.”

Mesmerized, I asked, “Is this true?”

She shrugged. “So I was told by my mother.”

“What other things did she tell you?”

“She also saw a baby’s head with a dog’s body. It could perform all kinds of tricks, like somersaulting, walking on two legs, chasing his own tail—”

“Oh, no! Lisa, your mother must have made this up.”

“No, she didn’t. But…it’s a horrible story.”

“What is it? Tell me.”

“The dog was skinned alive and right afterwards, its skin was wrapped onto the newborn baby until the two grew together.”

“Yuck, that’s really sick….”

“I told you it was horrible.”

“These stories are true?”

“What do you think?” She winked.

A pause before we both burst out laughing.

A long silence fell between us, then Lisa took out a pack of cigarettes, shook one out, tapped it on the pack, and handed it to me.

“No, Lisa, I don’t smoke.”

“Have you ever?”

“No.”

“It doesn’t hurt to try.”

“No thanks.”

“All right then.” She lit the cigarette, slid it between her lips with a slick movement of her hand, then took a deep drag. She released a mouthful of smoke, her lips still in the shape of a perfect O—or a chicken’s ass, as my mother would say; or a Zen circle, as Yi Kong would.

My eyes were smarting from the smoke.

Lisa asked, “So Michael is your boyfriend?”

The question took me by surprise. I carefully sipped my rum-soaked Coke, lowered my voice, and changed to a whispery tone, as if I were about to reveal the deepest secret. “Fiancé.”

She didn’t say anything, but kept squinting at me and blowing more clouds of smoke. “How did you meet?”

I sipped more of my rum and Coke, and before I’d decided what to say, began blurting out everything: how Michael and I had met in the Fragrant Spirit Temple; how he’d saved my life in the fire; my fall into the well when I was thirteen; my earlier contempt for men as well as my aspiration to be a nun; my friendship with Yi Kong and Dai Nam.

After I’d told her about myself, it seemed a new intimacy of sorts existed between us.

Lisa listened with a fascinated expression. “Incredible,” she said at last, raising her eyes to the ceiling and releasing a long, slow stream of smoke, then dropping her head and looking me in the eyes. “You called men ‘stupid piece of meat,’ ‘monk head,’ ‘four-eyed monster,’ ‘stinking testosterone,’ ‘walking garbage’? I love that!”

As if pulled by some magnetic force, I found myself shifting closer to her. She asked our “waitress” for another round of drinks.

Delicately she sipped her fresh martini, leaving a ring of her silvery lipstick on the glass. “Michael must be very fond of you.”

I nodded.

“Wonderful,” Lisa said, then she took a deep gulp of her drink and soundlessly laid down her glass. Next she picked up a few nuts and popped them into her mouth, chewing noisily with lips closed.

Suddenly the warmth in her eyes was gone and her voice was cold. “So when are you getting married?”

“He wants to soon, but I’m not sure I want it so quickly.”

“So you’re still not sure whether you want to marry him?”

“Not that—I love Michael. But I’ve spent most of my life hanging around nuns, so theirs is the world I’m comfortable in. Also, when you’re told over and over for fifteen years how human passion is illusory and how men are untrustworthy, it’s confusing. And I’m even more confused since I don’t feel that way with Michael. He seems as centered as a rock, and never bothered—”

“Nobody is not bothered by anything, Meng Ning.”

She sipped more of her martini and inhaled deeply her cigarette. “Now let me tell you another story. It’s Japanese, about a lighthouse watchman living on an island. He fell in love with a beautiful pearl diver who lived on the island opposite his. Every evening he turned on the light so his lover could see the way when she swam across the sea to meet him. Then he fell in love with another girl. One stormy night, when the pearl diver was swimming toward his lighthouse, he put out the light—”

“So what happened?”

“She drowned. Of course.” Lisa squashed her cigarette in the ash tray.

“Why do you tell such a terrible story?”

“That man was my fiancé.”

“Oh…”

Lisa seemed to wrestle with her emotions. “I use the story as a metaphor.” She paused, then said, “He dumped me…for someone else.” She bit her lips, her eyes darting around. “But I’m still in love with him.” She paused to stare into her glass, now quite empty. “You can’t analyze love, can you?”

Yi Kong could. Love is illusory. It’s the cause of suffering.

Lisa’s voice, mingled with the tobacco, wafted bittersweet toward me. “That fiancé was Michael. We were engaged.”

Back home, I felt dizzy and had a terrible headache. I paced back and forth in Michael’s apartment, waiting for the
click
of the door to bring his face.

Michael finally came home at 11:00
PM
. Before he even had a chance to take off his jacket, I told him that I had spent the evening with Lisa and that we needed to talk—right here and now.

“All right. I’ll explain. Let’s sit down.” He led me to sit on the sofa. “Meng Ning, yes, Lisa and I were engaged—a few years ago.”

“For how long?”

He hesitated, then said, “Five.”

“Five years? You were engaged for so many years and didn’t marry her?”

Michael didn’t answer my question. He continued on a different track. “After I’d become Professor Fulton’s student and gotten to know Lisa, he’d take us together to museums and concerts. In the beginning I did feel affection for her…she seemed interesting and intelligent.” He paused. “But then it turned out she has a personality disorder—”

“What do you mean?”

“She has frequent nervous breakdowns. When I told her I was going to break the engagement, she tried to slash her wrists…. Meng Ning, this was all in the past—can we just not talk about it now?”

Then the fortune-teller’s reading poured into my mind:

Some of his relatives, like his mother, father, or even son, will sacrifice their lives for him so that he can live a good life in this incarnation…his love life will not be smooth. In fact, it’s rather troubled. He might have more than one marriage.

I blurted, “So you also have a son with Lisa?”

Michael looked stunned. “Did she tell you that?”

“No. Remember, the Master of Living Buddha said you’ll have two marriages, and your son—” Now I understood Michael’s nervousness about his reading.

“Did you have a son with her?”

“Yes.”

“Oh, heavens, then where is he now?”

“He never lived. She aborted him during her fourth month of pregnancy.”

“You didn’t try to stop her?”

“She only told me after the abortion.”

“Is it because of your guilt that you stayed with her for so long?”

“Meng Ning, I’m too exhausted to go into this and I have another very hectic day tomorrow. Can we talk about this some other time?”

Through the night, though Michael slept as if comatose, I flipped and tossed by his side, imagining his wild past with Lisa. I also couldn’t help but imagine how he’d done it with
her
. Had he cupped her breasts as tenderly as he cupped mine? Had he whispered into her ears the same endearing phrases he whispered into mine? Had he slipped his tongue into her mouth and let it indulge itself in all kinds of decadent pleasures as it did in mine?

20

Philip Noble

M
ichael’s busy schedule kept him at the hospital for long hours and we didn’t have much chance to talk. Two days later, before I could bring up the issue of Lisa again, he had to go to Boston for two days, to attend a meeting about one of his research projects. He’d already told me about this and apologized when he’d invited me to visit him in the States.

Although I was still very upset by what had happened, without Michael’s presence the apartment suddenly seemed quiet, as if a veil had fallen over it. Pangs stabbed my chest as I saw the empty space by my side in the foyer mirror. I went to lie on the sofa, but the fabric felt cold under me.

Finally I went to the study, flipped on the desk lamp, and braced myself to do some reading. When I was picking my books, I noticed a folded card leaning against the lamp. On the side of the card was a gold phoenix, and next to it was Michael’s handwriting: “To Meng Ning.” I snatched it up and opened it. It read:

Dearest Meng Ning,

I’m so sorry I have to leave you on your own during your stay here. In case you need cash, there is some in the top desk drawer. The fridge is still stocked, but please also go out and have some nice meals. In case there is any problem, call Philip Noble, or for small matters, ask Frank the doorman. Take care. Sorry that we quarreled. I’ll talk more after I’ve come back. I love you.

Michael

I pulled out the drawer and found a pile of bills—fifties, twenties, tens, and ones. I counted; there was about five hundred dollars altogether. A surge of warmth rose inside me as I dropped the money back into the drawer, muttering, “
Hai,
Michael, I love you, too. But…”

Still feeling very confused and upset, I went to the kitchen and imitated a Cantonese café in Hong Kong by fixing myself a “fatty jumps into the sea”—a raw egg dropped into sugared hot water. Stirring the water and looking at the egg dissolve into surrealistic yellow-orange ribbons soothed my nerves. I nursed the glass to warm my hand, then sipped the scalding liquid and let out a sigh.

The phone startled me. I almost knocked over “fatty” as I reached to grab the receiver.

Steadying the glass, I said into the phone in a loving tone, “Hi, Michael, you miss me?”

To my shock, what came from the other end of the line was a vaguely familiar male voice. “Of course I miss you, Meng Ning.”

“Who is it?”

“Philip. Philip Noble.”

“Oh, Philip, how are you?” Michael’s glamorous buddy’s achingly handsome face quickly crept its way into my mind.

Then his rich baritone voice breathed into my ear. “Meng Ning, since Michael is away, I’m calling to ask if you need any help, like…my company?”

“Hmm…” I couldn’t really say
I don’t want your company,
could I? So I remained silent.

“Come on, Meng Ning, don’t be stuck at home by yourself—that’s not healthy. Come out and see the world.” Now his voice was like heavily sweetened hot cocoa, or my “fatty.” “You don’t have to be like Michael, who works so hard all the time. Anyway, Michael asked me to tend to you while he’s away. So, would you let me teach you how to relax and have fun?”

“Hmm…but I’d rather stay home…”

“Please, you should go out and let other people see how beautiful you are. Nice things should not be hidden from the world.”

“But, Philip…”

“No more ‘buts,’ Meng Ning. Michael will be away for two days. Can you just forget him for forty-eight hours? I’ll take you to a real nice restaurant and then a café that brews the best coffee you’ve ever tasted. Please, humor me.”

In spite of my uncertainty, I found myself chuckling at his language and heard myself mutter an “all right,” while the handsome face refused to vanish from my mind.

“Wonderful. I’ll pick you up at six this evening.”

At the door, I was surprised to see Philip holding a dozen elegantly wrapped, long-stemmed pink roses.

“For you, my Chinese Goddess.”

“Oh, Philip, you don’t have to do this.”

“But I can’t help it.”

A few minutes later, Philip was opening his car’s door for me. Although the car looked small and very uncomfortable with its extremely low seats, a few passersby threw us envious stares.

A thirtyish black man rushed toward us from the adjacent building, exclaiming, “Wow, a silver Lotus!”

Philip pointed a finger at him and split a white-toothed smile. “You bet.”

The black man winked. “Beautiful Chinese girl, too. Man, your luck’s up. You have it all!”

“Sure thing, pal.”

“You like the car?” Philip asked when the car hit the road. Despite the heavy Manhattan traffic, he managed the steering wheel like a performance artist.

“Not really. You’re so tall, don’t you find it uncomfortable with such low, plunge-and-hit-your-bottom-hard seats?”

He gave out a hearty laugh, silvery like his moving toy. “Then I must be a fool, paying a fortune to be uncomfortable. Meng Ning, that’s why I really like you. You’re so different from all my exes. A breath of fresh air among suffocating perfume.”

I didn’t know what to say to that. Then, in less than five minutes, Philip pulled to a stop in front of an elegant entrance. Out of nowhere, a young man arrived and took Philip’s key with extended hand, into which Philip stuffed a few bills.

“This is the very famous Russian Tea Room,” Philip said as he held my elbow and gently steered me into the lobby filled with elegantly dressed people, milling around or occupying thick, red leather seats amidst Tiffany lamps and luscious oil paintings of flowers and landscapes.

“We’re not dining here, but on the higher floor in the Palace.” He cast me a conceited, mysterious glance.

I understood right away why this was called the Palace the moment I stepped inside the dining hall. The ceiling was almost two stories high with a huge chandelier hanging low like an old womb. Crystals, like diamonds, shot their dazzle in all directions, not missing a soul. Everything seemed to be floating in gold, silver, and vibrant red.

A tuxedoed waiter led us to a seat at the corner under a floral oil painting and took our orders for drinks. In no time, he came back with a bottle of red wine and a glass for Philip and a Coke for me. Since I had had my “fatty” earlier and was not hungry, I decided to skip the appetizer and Philip said he would do the same to keep me company.

After the waiter scribbled down our orders and left, Philip clinked his glass against mine. “Welcome to the Big Apple, Meng Ning.”

“Thank you,” I said, feeling a little breathless in the company of such a gorgeous man.

Now I noticed that Philip was wearing a perfectly tailored beige suit and a gold silk tie. His thick mop of blond hair swayed to his fluid movements as if it had a life of its own. When he talked, he gestured a lot with his delicate hands and sensuous fingers. His eyes, blue and unfathomable as the night sky, possessed a dreamy expression as if he were forever enamored with this floating world.

“You like Coke a lot?”

“Yes, it’s my favorite Western beverage.”

“You want to try my fifty-year-
very-old
Château Lafite-Rothschild?”

“What’s that? No thanks.” Then I felt I had to challenge his emphasis on the
very-old
drink. “Philip, things have to be at least three to four hundred years old to be considered
very
old.”

He chuckled; sparks flicked in his blue eyes like twinkling stars. He changed the subject. “Since you dismiss my silver Lotus, hope you like this gold Palace?”

What should I say? The whole place smelled of money—old or nouveau—but to get rich was not my goal in life. Besides, as Yi Kong always pointed out, riches are transient and illusory.

However, I put on a stunning smile to match the stunning face across from me. “I think anyone would be impressed by the Louvre or Buckingham Palace. Only I would never live in such a place—too uncomfortable to inhabit, just like your Lotus.”

“Meng Ning, what secret formula do you possess to make yourself so likeable? “Philip stared straight at me, his voice sincere; his expressive blue eyes were now the color of Van Gogh’s starry sky. “Can I have the pleasure of knowing you better?”

Before I could respond, he continued. “How come I’m always a step behind Michael?” He let out a chuckle. Now his hair glistened like Van Gogh’s sunflower under the restaurant’s golden light. “Otherwise you could have been
my
fiancée. Why is he always so lucky to get the best?”

“Philip, don’t you already have all the best in life? Your Lotus, your practice…” I wanted to say
your movie-star good looks,
but stopped myself just in time. I definitely didn’t want him to think that I was attracted to him romantically…. Then my heart started to pound. Was I?

He squeezed my hand with his perfectly manicured one. “Maybe, Meng Ning, but I haven’t gotten the best woman.” He sipped his fifty-year-old drink meditatively, then said, “I’ve been with lots of women in my thirty-six years, but none as beautiful nor unique as you.”

“Philip, you barely know me.” Although I was flattered by what he said, he also made me feel uncomfortable.
Hai,
that’s exactly what Yi Kong told me over and over—never trust men, handsome or ugly, rich or poor, Oriental or Occidental.

“You’re definitely an old soul. I had this gut feeling the moment Michael introduced you to me.” He paused, his expression turning very tender and his voice intoxicating. “Meng Ning, allow me to be bold…I think maybe we were soul mates in our past lives.”

Before I knew how to respond, he went on. “To be honest, I’ve never known any woman who can bring out so much tenderness in my whole being. Right now, my heart is aching.”

“Philip, please…” While not knowing what to say, I felt a heat growing inside me and radiating through my whole body. I downed some more icy Coke while my eyes devoured the face of this Hollywood-handsome man, seemingly so approachable, and yet so distant.

Just then the waiter returned with our food. “Scampi with pasta for madame and steak tartare for the gentleman. Enjoy.”

The food was delicious, the drink soothing, and the setting romantic. Under the dazzling, yellowish light, Philip’s strong cheekbones and sharp jaw looked like they were chiseled from a sculpture. He looked very manly in a slightly disreputable way—a completely different kind of man from Michael. He was so excessively handsome that he seemed impossible to reach—even though he was sitting right across from me. But then why would he want to reach me so eagerly? Did he want me to be his next toy, a China doll, like his Lotus? Or just because Michael had asked him to tend to me while he was away?

We ate in silence for a while. The only sound was the pleasant clinking of the forks, knives, glasses, and dishes. I also noticed a few women—young and old—shooting envious glances toward me. The young girl across from our table accompanied a wrinkle-faced, richly dressed old man. The sexy girl at the table next to her seemed to draw away from her horse-faced nerd companion.

I tried but failed to suppress the corners of my lips from rising.

Philip looked at me curiously. “Hope you at least like your food. Good?”

The scampi melted inside my mouth. “It tastes like it was cooked by an imperial chef in an ancient palace where if the emperor took only one bite instead of two, the cook would be executed.”

“Wow, that’s really dramatic! I like that.” Philip smiled, showing his perfect white teeth. “There are two things I really love in life—good food and beautiful, intelligent women.”

“Me, too,” I said, spearing another scampi, “especially women. That’s why I am so close to my Buddhist nun mentor. She is beautiful, like a film star.”

“But Buddhist nuns have to shave their heads, right?” Philip took a hearty bite of his raw steak. “I can’t imagine a bald woman being attractive.”

“Not until you see my mentor.”

He was now sipping his wine thoughtfully. “But why would you have a nun as a mentor?”

I blurted out, “Because I wanted to be a nun, and it’s Michael who…” I stopped.

“You did? Michael never told me that!” He scrutinized me intensely. The blue of his eyes shone like a sapphire under the mysterious full moon. “That would be such a waste. Meng Ning, promise me, never try again to be a nun. Anyway, I don’t like nuns.”

“Why? These women are very nice, compassionate people,” I said, picking at my vegetables.

“Because they don’t like men! That really irks me, especially those pretty ones. They deprive men who deserve good women.”

I’d never thought of it that way.

He cut off another chunk of meat and put it into his mouth. I noticed the color of his sensuously moving lips matched exactly his blood-streaked steak. “Your naïveté makes you so appealing,” he said.

“Thanks, but I’m already thirty, so I don’t think I’m that naïve.” I tried but failed to twirl the pasta onto the fork.

He eyed my awkwardness with amusement for a while, then said, “That makes you even more naïve. OK, now tell me about your past with the nuns.” He put down his fork, then delicately dabbed his lips with the white napkin.

So I did.

After I’d finished, Philip held my hand for a long time before he finally released it. “Meng Ning, let’s go home.”

I was surprised that the place where he pulled up was not Michael’s apartment building. “Philip, but this is not where Michael lives.”

“I know. It’s where I live.”

Although I wanted very much to say I needed to go home, my body involuntarily followed his.

Philip’s apartment looked very different from Michael’s. While Michael’s was decorated with Chinese objects, Philip’s was, like him, glamorous and sumptuous. Richly colored abstract oil paintings and glass bookcases covered the walls. Antiques of various shapes and sizes struck elegant poses in ornate cabinets. The carpet was thick, lush, with Occidental motifs of mystical animals in vermillion, green, and purple.

“Very nice apartment,” I exclaimed. “But I think I really should go home. Michael may call anytime.”