Year of the Tiger

‘Hello!’

I look up. Standing in front of me is a Chinese guy, thirtyish, wearing a cheap leather jacket and a faded Beijing Olympics T-shirt, the one with the slogan ‘One World, One Dream.’

‘So sorry to bother,’ he continues. ‘You are American, right?’

‘No. I’m Icelandic.’

‘Ice … ?’ he stammers.

For whatever reason, I suddenly feel sorry for the guy. He’s not bad-looking; he’s got that near-babyfaced handsomeness like Chow Yun Fat did when he was young, but he also has a slight stutter and this sort of clueless vibe, like he doesn’t know what to make of me messing with him.

‘Yes, I’m an American,’ I allow. ‘And you’re … Chinese, maybe?’

He grins broadly, revealing slightly crooked but very clean teeth. ‘Why do you say that?’ he replies, joking back. Maybe he’s not so clueless.

‘Just guessing.’

‘Yes,’ he says. ‘Yes, Chinese. I am even a Beijing native.’

I snort. Everyone claims to be a native Beijinger. ‘Right. And you were probably born just next to the Temple of Heaven.’

He gives me his squinty-eyed, puzzled look again. ‘No. Close to Da Zhong Si. You know Da Zhong Si? That Great Bell Temple?’

‘Heard of it,’ I say noncommittally. I’ve been there before, actually. It’s no longer an active temple, but instead a bell museum, with bells from all around China and the entire world. Cool place, if you’re into bells.

‘That Great Bell was once biggest in the world,’ the guy says, seeming enthused about playing Beijing tour guide. ‘But now no longer. Now is Zhonghua Shiji Tan. Century Altar.’ He speaks English carefully, laying peculiar stress on the first syllables of the words. ‘Made in 1999, for the, the … the new …’

‘Millennium?’ I guess.

‘Yes,’ he says eagerly. ‘Yes, millennium.’

He extends his hand. ‘I am John.’

I can feel the tendons and muscles as his hand lightly closes around mine. He gives my hand a quick, awkward shake and lets go.

‘Yili,’ I reply.

John beams. ‘Oh, I think you speak Chinese. Am I right? Are you a student here, Yili?’

‘Sometimes.’

‘This is my, my … alma mater. I still come back at times. I enjoy to meet foreign students. So that I can practice. My English.’

‘Your English is very good,’ I say, because it’s what you’re supposed to say, and I’m sure his English is better than my Chinese.

‘No, no, my English is very poor.’ He stares at me for a moment. There’s not a lot of light in the hall, and it’s hard for me to make out his expression.

Then he blinks and ducks his head. ‘Yili, can I fetch you another beer?’

I should say no. I should leave, go back to the apartment. Spend some time thinking about what I’m going to do with my life after Trey divorces me and leaves the country and my visa runs out.

I should think about going home.

‘Sure,’ I say. ‘Thanks.’

Like I want to think about any of that.

In no time at all, John has returned with two cold Yanjings. He hands one to me with a small flourish, then holds up his bottle.

‘Ganbei,’ he says with a grin. Drink it dry.

We clink bottles and drink.

‘So, Yili, are you married? Do you have children?’

I try not to roll my eyes. Just about every Chinese person I meet asks me these questions.

‘Aren’t you gonna ask how old I am?’ I reply, as this is the inevitable third question in the ‘Way Too Personal’ trifecta.

John waves a hand. ‘Oh, no. I can see you are still very young. Maybe … not thirty?’

Actually, I’m twenty-six. ‘Just about.’

‘But no husband or children?’

‘No kids. Yes on the husband. But we’re separated.’

John shakes his head sadly. ‘This is the nature of the modern times, I think. The family life always suffers.’

‘Are you married, John?’

‘Me?’ For a moment, John looks uncomfortable. ‘No.’

‘Are your parents upset?’

Because if there’s one thing a Chinese son is supposed to do, it’s get married and have kids.

‘I just tell them to have patience,’ John says dismissively. ‘I am still the young man. I have … I have … benchmarks.’

‘Benchmarks?’

‘Of accomplishment. Before I am to have children. I have not achieved these yet, but I achieve them soon, I think.’

‘Oh,’ I say, and wipe my forehead. I’m already feeling a little buzzed. Not surprising, considering all I’ve had to eat today is a couple bites of spaghetti.

‘You see, it is hard if you are a young man in China and you are not rich,’ John continues, warming to his topic. ‘Because the Chinese women, they want a successful man. And they can choose who they want, because we have more men than women.’

He leans in closer to me. ‘Some Chinese women, they have second husband. Do you understand my meaning?’

‘Ummm …’ I think about it. Take another swallow of beer. ‘More than one?’

‘Not real husband,’ John confides. ‘More like … boyfriend. But these women, they have money. So they take care of boyfriend. Like concubine. You know that word?’

‘Sure,’ I say, finishing my beer. ‘My husband has one of those.’

‘Oh.’ I can see comprehension slowly dawning. ‘Your husband … he has …’ And here John ducks his head and sneaks a little grin. ‘The yellow fever, perhaps.’

‘Yeah, he’s fucking a Chinese girl,’ I snap, my knuckles whitening around the beer bottle, ‘if that’s what you want to know.’

John flushes red. ‘I am sorry. I just … I just made a bad joke. Please forgive me.’

His face is so open, so kind, that for a moment I’m flooded with guilt. And something else. Warmth, I guess. Just from having somebody be nice to me.

How pathetic is that?

I let out a big sigh. I feel like I’ve been holding my breath.

‘That’s okay.’

The weird thing is, suddenly it is okay. It’s been over between me and Trey for a long time. And considering what it is that held us together, the thing we really shared, maybe I should start being glad that it’s over.

Starting right now.

‘I’m sorry too, John. It’s just that I’ve had a rough –’ A giggle starts bubbling up from my throat. ‘A rough six years or so,’ I manage.

I want to laugh, and keep laughing, and never stop.

John grins back. ‘Yili, would you like another beer?’

Maybe I shouldn’t, because I pounded this one, and I’m already kind of loaded. But it feels good. I feel lighter somehow.

‘Sure,’ I say. ‘Thanks.’

I lean against the wall and close my eyes. What would it be like, really being free from Trey? Just not caring about him any more. Not ever seeing him again or having anything to do with him, and not having that feel like some hole in the place where my soul is supposed to be, like the part of me that’s able to care about somebody else has gone missing.

Not ever thinking about those times again.

You’ll always think about those times, I tell myself. Always. But maybe, maybe you can think about those times and, from now on, they won’t hurt you so much. Those times, they’ll just be things that happened in the past, and that’s all.

‘Yili?’

I open my eyes. Here’s John standing in front of me, holding two bottles of beer. He’s actually pretty handsome, not really baby-faced; he has a strong jaw, bright eyes, light stubble on his chin. And he’s taller than I am. Solid, with some muscle. I think I can see the outline of his chest beneath the T-shirt.

One World, One Dream.

‘Do you feel okay?’

‘Sure. I’m just a little tired.’

John hands me a beer, already opened, like the last one. ‘We could go sit down somewhere,’ he says, ‘if you are tired.’

‘Okay,’ I say. I’m tired of all the noise, anyway.

We make our way outside. ‘I know a good place,’ John says. I stifle a giggle. Does he want to make out or something? I might be up for that. It might be fun, messing around a little. He’s cute, I’ve decided. I take another swallow of beer.

It’s a nice night. I’m warm enough with just my light jacket. John leads me down a bricked path that leads to a garden of sorts. I’ve been here before. There’s a fountain and a marble wall inscribed with calligraphy, the grooves highlighted by gold paint. Some fucking proverb about wisdom and self-cultivation, probably.

We sit on the stone bench by the fountain. I can hear the music from the party, but it’s so faint that I feel like I could almost be imagining it, making up music from the gurgle and flow of the fountain’s water.

‘This where you used to take girls?’

John grins slyly. ‘Sometimes.’ He takes a pull of his beer and leans toward me a little. ‘Do you have a boyfriend, Yili?’

‘Maybe. Sort of. I don’t know.’

‘What does that mean?’ John sounds curious. Like he honestly wants to understand.

I have to really think about it for a minute. I look up, through the haze of dust and city lights. Haloes surround the streetlights, the stars. It’s all so beautiful, in an ugly kind of way.

‘He’s a good guy,’ I finally say. ‘A really good guy. I like him. And I know he likes me. He’s nice.’

Then I can’t help it: I start laughing. ‘That sounds really lame.’

‘No, Yili, it doesn’t sound … lame.’ John has to work a little to get that last word out, like it sticks somewhere on the middle of his tongue. ‘But you say you don’t know about him.’

‘I mean, I don’t know …’

My head feels funny. The sound of the fountain thrums in my ears, or maybe it’s the music. I swallow some more beer. It goes down like it’s something alien, cold and coppery. ‘What he wants from me. I mean … we spend a lot of time together. But I’m not sure why.’

‘You think he wants you to do something for him?’

‘No. No, I …’ I squeeze my eyes shut. Everything feels funny. My eyes are too big; they’re sticking out, and I need to cover them up. ‘He’s nice,’ I repeat. ‘Maybe he just feels sorry for me.’

‘Yili?’ John says. ‘Yili?’

It’s too loud. I put my hands over my ears. ‘I feel kind of weird,’ I manage.

‘Are you ill?’ John asks anxiously. ‘Should we go to the doctor?’

‘No. No … I just …’ There’s a beer bottle in my hand. I’m holding it. It’s solid and cold, and I can feel the damp from the condensation. Like, the beer that’s inside the bottle wants to get out, and it’s squeezing through tiny holes in the glass. I take another sip. Free the beer!

‘Feel weird.’

‘I think maybe you should go home, Yili.’ He holds out his hand. ‘Come. I’ll take you.’

I stare at him. His eyes are bright, sparkling almost, even in the dark. I stare at his hand. It looks too big.

‘I don’t want to go home,’ I say.

‘Here.’ His hand reaches down. Finds mine. Closes over it, dry and hot, like some trespasser from the desert.

‘Stand up,’ he says.

I do what he tells me to. I don’t even think to argue about it. I stand up, and my bad leg buckles, and I pitch forward.

John catches me. I see his face as I fall; he looks surprised and almost embarrassed.

‘Sorry,’ I mumble. ‘My leg’s messed up.’

‘I’ll help you,’ John says. ‘Here, I take your arm.’

He has me drape my arm around his shoulders, and he threads his arm across my back and under my armpit. He won’t quite look at me, I notice. That’s funny, I think. Why should he be embarrassed? I’m the one who’s somehow gotten so fucked up that I can’t walk.

How’d that happen, I wonder?

It finally occurs to me, as we mutually stagger down the path that leads out of the garden and into the campus proper, that I’ve been dosed with something.

‘Wait,’ I say. ‘Wait. I don’t wanna go with you.’

‘What, Yili?’

‘Let me go,’ I say. ‘Let me go. I just wanna … Let go of me.’

‘Yili, I think maybe you are a little sick,’ John says, sounding very sympathetic. ‘I help you to get home. That is all. You don’t need to worry about me.’

I don’t believe him. I try to pull away. The arm encircling me holds me tighter against him. We stumble down the walkway, through the quad of dormitories, past the take-out window of the Xinjiang restaurant where students line up for lamb skewers and sesame bread.

I should yell. I should scream. I should kick him in the nuts and run. But I don’t. I can’t. We keep walking, his fingers pressing hard against my ribs, until we’ve reached the campus gate, where teenage security guards in stiff gray polyester jackets stand nominal sentry.

‘Come on, Yili,’ John says. ‘This way.’

A shiny silver car waits for us on the other side.

CHAPTER FIVE

I picture the finger-shaped bruises John’s hand is making on my ribcage as he guides me toward the silver car. There’s a guy leaning against it, smoking a cigarette. John gestures angrily at him. ‘Off my car!’ he snaps.

‘Fuck your mother,’ the guy mutters. But he lifts himself off the car, takes one last drag on his cigarette, and flicks it into the gutter before ambling away.

‘Hey,’ I say. ‘Wait.’

‘Now, Ellie, you don’t want to talk to that guy,’ John chides me. ‘He is just some rascal.’

‘It’s all a show,’ I say, ‘isn’t it? That guy drove the car here.’

John does his best puzzled squint, but I’m not buying it any more. ‘Of course not. He is just some local rascal.’

‘But there’s no parking here,’ I say, and I’m feeling like this is maybe the most brilliant thing I’ve ever said.

John laughs as he opens the passenger door. ‘Oh, Yili! You are very funny. Now, get into the car.’

I don’t want to get in. I plant my feet, but I’m really messed up, and my leg isn’t that stable anyway, and John somehow knocks me off balance, and I fall across the seats, hitting my cheek against the gear-shift, and John swings my legs into the car and slams the door.

The car has an open moonroof. I stare up, trying to see through the haze to the stars.

The driver’s door opens, and John gets in, putting the keys in the ignition before his butt hits the seat. My head’s touching his thigh as the car pulls away from the curb.

‘Where’re we going?’ I mumble. My mouth feels like it’s full of stones.

‘I told you, Yili. To your home.’

I can’t even sit up. I just lie there, head pressed against John’s thigh, feeling his muscles bunch and relax as he brakes and accelerates. Streetlights pass over us.

I don’t know how long we drive.

Finally, it seems, we get somewhere. John rolls down his window, mutters something to another teenage security guard in a gray polyester jacket, I don’t hear what. I stare up through the moonroof. I can see the tops of tall buildings, satellite dishes, a square of sky. But no stars.

‘Here we are, Yili.’

He gets out and opens the passenger door. I lie there. I don’t think I can move. John’s face looms over me. ‘Oh, Yili,’ he says. ‘I think maybe you are very sick.’

‘I … I …’

‘Here. Take my hand.’

I try, feebly grasping at it like my fingers have gone boneless; they’re just these white worms, jellyfish fingers, waving around in a black sea.

John scoops me up, hands placed beneath my shoulder blades and butt, lifting me out of the car. My feet touch the ground but don’t want to stay there.

‘Here,’ John says. ‘I carry you.’

And he does. My arms circle around his neck, because they don’t know what else to do.

I rest my cheek against John’s leather jacket and close my eyes, lost in the rock and sway of his steps as he carries me along like I’m some little kid in her daddy’s arms. I catch his scent beneath the smell of cheap, tanned leather: sweat mixed with some bad cologne. I like the sweat better.

‘Yili,’ John says, his breath warm in my ear. ‘What is your apartment number?’

‘What?’

‘Your apartment number. What is it?’

I open my eyes, and it’s the weirdest thing: my apartment building looms above us.

Wait, I think. Wait. He doesn’t know my apartment number, but he knows where I live. That doesn’t make sense. How does he know where I live?

‘You told me this, Yili. At the party. Don’t you remember?’

Did I just say that out loud? I guess I did.

‘Twenty-one oh-five,’ I slur.

I just want to lie down.

I just want to go home.

We take the elevator upstairs. It’s empty, the tall stool where the fuwuyuan sits when she’s on duty unoccupied. I stare at it, the empty stool surrounded by mirror tile, fake wood paneling and fluorescent light, and try to conjure up some meaning to it, but I can’t.

Here we are in the foyer.

As John fumbles at my door (Does he have my keys? Did I give them to him?), I see a sharp beam of white light, and fucking Mrs Hua pokes her head out from her apartment.

‘What sort of things are going on now?’ she hisses. ‘This is really more than anyone should bear!’

John turns his head in her direction. ‘Your business ends at your eaves, old Auntie.’ The way he says it, so cold and matter-of-fact, would scare me – that is, if I could feel afraid right now.

Mrs Hua can. She pulls back behind her door. ‘Show some respect,’ she mutters as she slams it shut and locks it with both chain and bar.

John carries me inside.

He steps carefully through the maze of computer parts, the cardboard Yao Ming, the piles of clothes and books in the near-dark, the only light in the room what’s leaking in through the windows from a Beijing sky that’s never really dark any more.

‘Which room, Yili?’

Now, suddenly, I do get scared. ‘Chuckie?’ I say. But my voice is weak, weak like in a dream where you can’t cry out, where you can’t make anyone hear you. ‘Chuckie?’ I try again.

‘No one is here,’ John tells me. ‘Besides, you shouldn’t worry.’

He takes me into my room and lays me down on my futon. He doesn’t turn on the light, but the nightlight by the door has come on.

For a moment, he stands over me. His face is in shadow, but he’s staring at me, I can tell.

‘I am going to make you more comfortable,’ he says softly.

He kneels down by the futon. First he takes off my sneakers and socks, balling up the socks and putting them in the shoes, placing the shoes in the closet, lined up neatly.

Then he hesitates before reaching for the top button of my jeans.

‘Don’t,’ I say. ‘Don’t.’

‘Now, Yili, you cannot be comfortable in these.’

I can’t stop him. I can barely move. He unbuttons my jeans, lifts me up, and slides them over my butt and then off. He folds them up, looks around, and then puts the jeans on the room’s one chair.

He kneels down next to me again. His eyes fall on my bad leg, and he reaches out and lightly touches a place where two long scars cross, then the hollow from the chunk of missing muscle. ‘Oh,’ he says, in a curious voice. ‘You were badly hurt, I think.’

I bite my lip and nod. Tears stream from my eyes, and I can’t control that either.

He gives my leg a final, gentle pat. Then he reaches under my back, beneath my shirt, and unhooks my bra. He rocks back on his heels. ‘Yili, I have to take this off too,’ he says, with a trace of apology. Then he peels my shirt up and over my head. For a moment, the shirt catches on my chin, collapses on my face like a death-mask, and as I breathe in, the cotton sealing my nostrils, I think maybe it will suffocate me, and that’s what John wants to do to me. But no. He frees the shirt from my head. Turns it right side out, folds it, and lays it neatly on top of my jeans on the chair.

He turns back to me, smiling awkwardly. He pulls one bra strap down along my arm until it clears my hand. Then the other. He holds my bra in his hand, and for a moment he stares at my tits. Then he looks away and drapes the bra over the back of the chair.

I’m lying there naked except for my panties. I’m shaking. The room seems to vibrate.

John’s back is to me. He’s rummaging through the little dresser next to my closet. ‘Ah,’ he says, satisfied. ‘This is good.’

He has in his hands a large T-shirt. ‘I think maybe this will be comfortable for you.’

He puts it over my head, lifts me up a little, and I can feel the dry heat radiating from his hand pressed flat between my shoulder-blades.

After he gets the T-shirt on me, he finds the light blanket I use most warm spring nights and covers me with it.

‘Just a minute,’ he says, and leaves.

I lie there. The room is still vibrating, but not so quickly.

When John returns, he carries a glass of water and something wrapped in a dishcloth. He sits cross-legged by my head. ‘Here, Yili,’ he says. ‘Have some water.’

‘I don’t … You put something in it.’

‘Don’t be silly. You are sick. You need some water.’

He tilts up my head so I won’t choke and pours a little water between my lips. I swallow. He pours some more. It tastes good. Like nectar. Like something I need.

‘There. You see?’

When I finish, he smoothes the hair from my forehead. ‘I have some ice,’ he says, holding up the dishcloth. ‘Your face, it’s bruised. I think maybe when I help you in the car, I’m too careless.’ He puts the dishcloth against my cheek. ‘I’m sorry about this, Yili.’

I feel the cold seep through the cloth to my cheek, soaking into my skull and spreading through my head. Everything slows down.

‘That’s okay,’ I say.

John sits there quietly, holding the ice against my cheek.

‘Why you come to China, Yili?’ he finally asks.

I chuckle. ‘Trey. He got a job. I came with him.’

‘What kind of work does he do?’

‘Security consultant. For a big corporation.’ I laugh again. ‘Kind of like a really well-paid bodyguard.’

‘Really?’

‘Kind of.’ Of course, it’s more than that, really. Trey assesses threats. Looks for holes. Keeps people safe.

‘I see.’

I must have spoken out loud again, without meaning to.

‘And this pays well?’

‘It pays okay.’

John brushes a stray hunk of my hair off my face.

‘So, Trey, he does not work for American government.’

‘Big corporation.’ I laugh. ‘What’s the difference?’

John nods sagely. ‘You know, here in China, PLA, Peoples’ Liberation Army, owns many businesses. They hide this better now than before, but still it is this way. So maybe this is somewhat the same as America.’

This irritates me, and I’m not sure why. ‘It’s the other way around in America,’ I tell him. ‘Companies own the Army. They send us where they want us to go. To do their shit for them. So they can get rich.’

‘Ah. I see. So you are in the Army, Yili?’

‘I don’t wanna talk about it.’

‘Why not? It can be good to talk, I think.’

‘No. It’s not.’

But I can see it. That’s the thing. I can fucking see it. I don’t want to. I don’t want to see this shit any more. ‘Oh god,’ I say. ‘Oh, Jesus. Where the fuck were you? You fucking liar.’

John strokes my face, my hair. ‘Yili, I am sorry. I don’t want to upset you.’

I’m crying again. ‘Fuck you,’ I say. ‘You’re just another liar.’

He says nothing.

After a while, he gets up and leaves the room, closing the door behind him.

I lie there. I’m floating. I’m swaddled in clouds. I can’t move.

‘John?’ I call out. ‘John?’

He doesn’t come. I’m alone.

‘I’m sorry,’ I whisper, ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it. I didn’t mean to. I hate myself. I want to die.’

‘Yili, why do you talk like that?’

‘John?’

Where did he come from? He crouches down next to me. Takes my hand. ‘Have some water.’

I drink. I drink like it’s somehow going to save my life. Like it will replenish everything I’ve lost.

I’m pretty fucked up right now.

John sighs. ‘This boyfriend of yours. I don’t understand. Why doesn’t he take better care of you?’

‘He’s busy.’

‘But this is not right,’ John states. ‘If you are together with him, he should take care of you. This is only proper.’