Beijing Comrades (24 page)

Twenty-Six

Two weeks after National Day I received a piece of news about as welcome as a kick in the teeth. Yang Youfu, the stubby, fat-faced cousin of my ex-girlfriend Hao Mei, had been arrested. There had been no warning signs. Before Liu Zheng walked into my office and told me the news, I never could have predicted he'd be grabbed.

My first instinct was to wash my hands clean of any ties we had, however minor they might have been. At the same time, I wasn't going to drop stones on a drowning man by going to the police with what I knew. I wasn't that callous, and besides, talking to the authorities would only be implicating myself in the case.

The night of the arrest, Liu Zheng and I stayed at the office longer than usual to discuss Yang Youfu's arrest and, more importantly, what might happen next. We needed to make an objective assessment of whether or not we were going to be affected. At first, Liu Zheng was brimming with ideas about how to divert the impending disaster. But by the time we poured our seventh shot glass of baijiu, helpful advice was turning into poison arrows. We had a fight, a big one.

“Handong,” he said, “I gotta tell ya—and I'm speaking from the heart now—you're fucking up big time right now. It's just one mistake after another.” He filled my glass. “If you don't come forward with information about Yang Youfu, you're only going to burn yourself in the end. I don't care if it seems callous. Whatever it takes to protect yourself, you do it.”

“Yeah, I know,” I said curtly. “Anyway, I've already helped the police as much as I can.” That was bullshit and we both knew it. “I don't want to think about it anymore.” I polished off another glass of liquor and plunked it down loudly on the table between us.

Liu Zheng looked at me in exasperation. “Well, if you don't want to think about this, Handong, what do you want to think about? Are you going to spend the rest of your life thinking about nothing but Lan Yu?” He looked at me fixedly.

“Look,” he continued in a conciliatory tone. “I know he's not a bad kid, okay? But he's not exactly good for you either!”

“Excuse me,” I retorted, “but I do recall you being the one who picked him up to begin with.” I was becoming angry.

“Right,” he said, “but I never imagined it would turn into something like this! I thought you were just messing around. How could I have possibly known you would end up taking the relationship seriously?” I stared at my glass in silence, and Liu Zheng saw his chance to dig in deeper.

“It was a mistake for you to leave Lin Ping,” he said, taking a long drag on his cigarette. “Keep on like this and it's just going to get worse and worse, Handong.” Red-gray ash sizzled and fell to the floor.

“Lin Ping was a fucking monster,” I said.

“You're wrong, Handong,” he said sternly. “That woman never did a thing to you. So she was a little scheming in the way she dealt with things. Who isn't these days? People aren't stupid anymore, Handong. They're going to catch on to things.
You know as well as I do that the whole fax thing wasn't her idea, it was our Ma's. And the money she transferred out of the company account? You divorced her, Handong—what was she supposed to do? You gave her no choice but to do it. Before this whole thing happened, she never did you wrong.” He took a big mouthful of liquor, then looked at me as if waiting for a response. I didn't correct him by saying that Lin Ping was the true mastermind behind the fax.

“And don't forget,” he persisted, “after the divorce was finalized, she never came after you for anything. She just went on with her life and let you go on with yours. Let's be clear about that, okay?”

I was growing sick of Liu Zheng's shrill housewife bitching. “If you think she's so great, why don't you go bang her yourself? I promise not to tell your wife.”

Liu Zheng slammed his glass on the table. “I'm sick of your shit, Handong!” he yelled, his face purple with rage. “Let me make things clear for you, since you can't seem to figure it out on your own. You fucked everything up, but didn't have the balls to blame yourself or Lan Yu, so you saved all your venom for your wife. You know I'm right—if we weren't childhood friends, I would never say this to you!”

I stood up from my chair. “What the fuck do you know?” I shouted. “You're a fucking nobody! Who are you to come in here and throw accusations at me?” I knew I was going too far with this language, but I wasn't about to apologize.

“Right, Handong, I'm a nobody.” Liu Zheng stood up and looked me in the eye. “Who else but a nobody would stick around in this shitty job for so long? You think I haven't paid my dues here? Well, let me tell you something: Putting up with the crap that goes on in this place, I've probably shaved five years off my life. If I was just muddling along, I'd have a lot less
stress than I do now. I don't owe you shit, Handong, and I have no problem leaving this place. You want to fire me? Fucking fire me! China's a big country. Liu Zheng won't go hungry.” He held his shot glass in the air as if to toast me, then dropped it on the table below. It didn't break, but the effect was jarring. He picked up his jacket and stormed out of the office.

I sat back down, utterly shell-shocked that someone I'd known for decades would turn against me in this way.

Whatever else had been said, we both knew the real issue was Lan Yu. There was nothing I'd been unwilling to sacrifice for him. I'd worried my mother to death. I'd sat idly by while my friends and associates gossiped about me. I'd insulted my closest friend and lost my wife. And yet, for all that, I was still alone, unable to hold on to the one person for whom it had all been done.

I slammed my fist against the wall. If Lan Yu didn't love me—if we truly weren't fated to be together—then it was all in vain, all this sorrow was for nothing. I calmed down somewhat and poured myself another drink. Maybe we really were better off apart.

I stayed in my office for the rest of the night, doing my best to process everything that had happened. At four in the morning, I finally fell asleep on the couch, swearing to myself that if Lan Yu didn't call me, we would never see each other again. I certainly wouldn't be calling him.

And yet, Lan Yu did call. The following Saturday he rang my cell phone—long since updated since the Big Boss days—and asked me to come to his house.

I was surprised. It was rare for him to invite me over on the weekend, so rare that I would joke sardonically that I was his “Tuesday lover,” or perhaps one of the “discreet afternoon
playmates” I had read about in the personal ads of American newspapers. But however surprised and even thrilled by the offer I might have been, it didn't matter anyway. I had to decline Lan Yu's invitation because I had a major dinner event that evening that I couldn't miss.

“Where's your dinner?” he asked. I told him it was at the Fangshan Hotel.

It was past ten when the banquet was over. I had drunk a lot that night, and my head felt heavy and dizzy as I stumbled back to the parking lot where the company driver was waiting for me. Just as I was about to get in the backseat, I heard a voice call my name. “Chen Handong!” I turned and found myself face-to-face with Lan Yu.

“What are you doing here?” I asked, surprised.

“I've been here all night,” he replied. “I got here at seven.”

It was a chilly late-October night and Lan Yu had waited outside for me for over three hours. What did it mean? I was completely thrown off guard by the idea that he cared for me that much. First he rejects me, now he's here. What kind of game was he playing?

I sent the driver off without me, and Lan Yu and I took a cab to his place at Gala. When I asked him why he had come looking for me at the Fangshan, he just smiled. I pressed him to answer the question and he laughed. “I guess I just had nothing better to do tonight!”

Waves of nausea hit me as the alcohol churned in my stomach and the smell of cheap cologne in the back of the taxi filled my nostrils. I didn't feel like talking—couldn't in fact—so I leaned my head against the window and shut my eyes.

“Have you been very busy lately?” a voice rang out of nowhere. I had almost forgotten where I was.

“Mmmm . . .,” I groaned, more asleep than awake. I looked
through the vertical bars separating us from the driver. I was looking for something to focus my eyes on to keep from vomiting.

He turned his head to look at me. “You okay?”

Slowly I rolled my head in his direction, then looked back out the window and squeezed out an “uh-huh.” His gaze remained fixed on me, but he was quiet.

The taxi sped through the night, passing a seemingly endless number of intersections and traffic lights. It was close to eleven at that point, and the streets were empty except for the occasional cluster of late-night food vendors stationed along highway underpasses. I looked out the window at the throngs of weekend warriors slurping noodles from huge plastic bowls. Unrolling the window to get some air, I caught a few words from an argument taking place on the street. A skinny, red-faced guy with an impressively chiseled flattop and a girl with an even redder face and huge, clunky shoes were going at it.

“I never said that!” the guy threw up his hands and yelled.

“Bull!” the girl screamed back at him, hands on her hips, an angry look on her face.

Lan Yu's body morphed under the rapidly flashing lights, which transformed the inside of the car into a kaleidoscope of color. We were only arm's length from each other, and yet I couldn't see his face clearly. Was there something wrong with my vision, or was the distance between us greater than I had thought?

“I've been waiting for you to call,” he said, pulling me out of my reverie. I turned to look at him and noted with surprise that I could finally see him clearly. His big, round eyes settled on my face, and he looked at me earnestly, as if trying to convince me that what he had just said was true. Clumsily, I reached out an arm to wrap it around him and pull him closer.
He laughed nervously and threw a glance at the rearview mirror, where we could see the taxi driver looking back at us with a wide-open stare.

“Who cares about him?” I whispered drunkenly into Lan Yu's ear. “None of his fuckin' business!” I pulled him closer, then collapsed onto his shoulder.

Don't overthink it, I told myself just before passing out. He came looking for you. He still wants you, and that's what counts.

Back in his apartment, Lan Yu made some hot tea to wake me up and shake me out of my languor. The shoddy little heater in his bedroom was hardly enough to keep us warm, so we shivered under the blankets. When I had more or less sobered up, I pulled him into my arms, hoping to trap our collective body heat between us.

“What the hell kind of way to live is this?” I complained. “Here it is, practically November, and they still haven't turned the heat on?”

“They don't turn it on till the fifteenth.”

“That's bullshit,” I replied grumpily. My temples throbbed in anticipation of the hangover that was coming.

“Aw . . .,” Lan Yu goaded me playfully. “Is the young master troubled by a draft?”

I laughed. No doubt about it: he had definitely become more skilled in the art of playful banter in the two years we'd been apart.

“Hey, you know I can't take the cold like you,” I said, pressing my cheek against his lips in search of a kiss. “I still remember when you used to wear that thin white jacket in the wintertime. You must have been out of your mind!” I was recalling the day we had stood outside Country Brothers as
light, fluffy snowflakes fell around us like feathers and I put my scarf around his neck. It was only the third time we had gotten together. A lifetime ago.

“What? When did I ever do that?” Lan Yu protested, as he pulled my arms tighter across his chest. “Oh, right! I remember that jacket. I used to wear it every time I saw you. It was the nicest thing I owned at the time.” He laughed. “I used to go crazy before seeing you. I was like a girl meeting her suitor for the first time before the arranged marriage. Then you had that ex of yours bring me that other jacket from Hong Kong! I still can't believe you did that.”

“So, what about now?” I asked. “Do you still feel like you're seeing your suitor for the first time?” I looked at his profile, wondering whether he still wore the bluish-gray jacket I'd asked Min to buy for him.

He stopped laughing. “No,” he said. “I don't. It's not like that anymore.”

“What's it like, then?”

Lan Yu stared ahead in silence, eyes fixed on the other side of the room. Then he turned to me with a teasing smile.

“Just messing around, right?” He freed himself from my gripping embrace and climbed on top of me. “Hey, Comrade Chen,” he continued. “How about a little physical education? I want to see you work up a sweat!”

When Lan Yu and I kissed, nothing else mattered. The world disappeared and there was nothing but the mingling of our bodies. Right and wrong, truth and falsehood, the present moment and time without end—all these categories became meaningless. I needed him, needed his beautiful body. I could sculpt him like clay. I could bite him, even violate him. There was only us. He was mine.

But when we weren't together—that was when things became more complicated.

After making love we lay in bed quietly, just holding each another and basking in the postcoital glow. His breathing became steady, and before long he was fast asleep.

When we awoke the following morning, I asked him what he had on his agenda that day.

“Oh man,” he said. “I have a ton of stuff to do today.” And that was it.

I didn't ask for details. I was as busy as he was, and besides, I knew independence—cruel, secretive independence—was the basis of our relationship now.

I left Lan Yu's apartment and went back to my room at Country Brothers. That's where I was sleeping most nights at that point.