Bitter Winds (19 page)

L
ily listened to them talk from the hallway where she’d crept after she’d heard her Ye Ye come in. She could tell by his slow gait and the heavy dragging of his feet that he carried bad news. He’d gone straight to the kitchen and now he, along with Li Jin, Sami, and Nai Nai, sat around the table discussing how to get Ivy out. Lily knew he’d talk more openly if she didn’t join them.

“My father didn’t have the money. I have no way to pay the fine to bring Ivy home.”

“Oh, Benfu. How can they just keep her like this? She’s just a child.”

Lily heard more movement; cups clinking together, tea being poured, Lan gurgling from her basket near the fireplace.

“It’s that official—Delun—he’s a tyrant,” Benfu said.

“Baba’s right, Mama. Most of the officials are egotistical bullies,” Li Jin said. “And Sami said the mental hospital is a common place to put people to get them out of the way, even if they don’t have mental issues. It’s just another way for corrupt officials to make money under the table. Isn’t that right, Sami?”

Sami mumbled something about Linnea that Lily couldn’t make out, so she stepped closer.

“No, I can’t ask her,” Ye Ye said. “Linnea used her savings to pay for Maggi’s surgery last year. She didn’t want me to tell anyone it came from her, but that’s why I can’t ask her for a loan. She emptied out all she had. She even put the wedding off for another year to do it.”

“That was very generous,” Li Jin said.

“And you went over to your father’s house today, Benfu. Right? How did that go?” Nai Nai asked.

She heard her Ye Ye sigh deeply before he spoke again. “My father only had one idea but it wasn’t something I’ll do.”

Lily leaned in closer. Any option was now their only option, right? What would her Ye Ye possibly refuse to do that could get her sister home?

“What did he say?” Nai Nai asked.

“He said the violin is worth a lot of money, that we could sell it.”

Quiet settled around the room and Lily felt her breath catch in her throat. Her violin? Viola? Sell it? She swallowed. It wasn’t really even a hard decision. Her Ye Ye had said it was hers when he gave it to her. That meant only she could decide.

“But I told him that wasn’t an option,” Ye Ye said.

Lily started to back away, but then Li Jin spoke. She stopped. “There’s another option, Baba.”

“What is it?”

“I have the deed to this place in the safe. It’s free and clear. We can use it as collateral for a loan.”

Lily held her breath, waiting to see what her Ye Ye would say.

Her Nai Nai beat him to a response. “No, Li Jin. This place is yours—it’s the only thing you’ll have when we’re gone. We don’t want you to put it in jeopardy.”

“It wouldn’t work anyway. A bank’s not going to loan us any money, even with collateral, when we don’t have an income to pay it back with. These days the government still controls the banks, and loans are hard to come by,” Ye Ye said.

“I wasn’t talking about a bank,” Li Jin said, just as Lan let out another squeal.

Lily could hear her get up and go to the baby. She stepped back another foot or so, in case Li Jin looked her way. But what was she talking about? Who else would loan them money?

“Then who?” Ye Ye asked.

“Shadow lenders,” Li Jin whispered, so low that Lily almost didn’t hear her over Lan’s noises.

“Do you mean loan sharks?” Nai Nai said, and Lily could hear the alarm in her voice.

Lily heard a chair being pushed back and Sami spoke. “A loan shark is different from a shadow lender. The loan sharks are small-time and usually connected to something illegal, while the shadow lenders have cropped up all over China to give loans to people for small businesses, medical bills, and other things that the government-owned banks won’t touch.”

“That sounds like something we can possibly do, right?” Nai Nai asked. Lily heard the hope in her voice.

“Maybe,” Li Jin said. “But we still have the issue of no way to prove to them we’ll pay it back. We’d have to make up a different reason than using it for Ivy—maybe invent a small business so they know income will be coming in.”

“Speaking of paying it back, you do realize that these organizations charge anywhere from eighteen to twenty percent interest? That’s robbery,” Ye Ye said, and Lily heard him move farther away and guessed he was going to stand in front of the fireplace, or to take Baby Lan from Li Jin.

“Benfu, you’re going to have to stop being so stubborn,” Nai Nai said. “We need to just listen to Li Jin and go to one of these shadow lenders. We’ll get the money, and get Ivy home. Then we’ll figure out where to go from there.”

Li Jin spoke. “And we can all work together to find a way to pay it back. Linnea and Jet will help. We’ll all scour the streets for collections, and maybe we really can start our own small business. I can bake, or we can grow tea leaves, or—I don’t know . . . something.”

“Better be careful who you borrow from. . . .” Lily heard Sami trail off with a warning tone.

“I don’t know. I’ve always felt that borrowing is only a step up from begging. But let me think about it today. Sami’s right—we need to be careful when it comes to underground moneylenders. They’re usually the scourge of society. There must be some other way,” Ye Ye said, his voice getting louder and footsteps moving toward Lily. “And it’s not a good solution, but we might just have to let Ivy finish Lily’s sentence while our application for a review to overturn her fine is being processed.”

Lao Gong had walked him through the steps to apply for a review the day after Lily had been taken, but so far they’d heard nothing from the panel of so-called patient advocates.

Lily backed up another few steps and then turned to head back to their room. As her fingers trailed along the wall, she weighed her options. If her Ye Ye wouldn’t go to the shadow lenders, it would be up to her to find a way to get her sister home.

Li Jin stood at the counter drying the freshly washed pots. Dinner had been a somber affair and she’d urged most of the others out, wanting the room to herself. Even her Baba and Nai Nai had left, saying they were going for a walk to discuss the situation. Lily, the pitiful thing, was sitting outside with Jojo as he rode his bike. Li Jin had asked her to go out with him, knowing she needed to be doing something to keep her mind off Ivy. Only Sami had stayed to help her clean. Or at least what Sami thought cleaning was. Together they’d worked silently until Li Jin couldn’t stand the silence any longer.

“Sami, I need your help.”

Sami stopped and looked up, one hand on her hip. “I’m sweeping your floor, looking like some scullery maid, what else do you want?”

“Not that kind of help. Serious stuff. You know more about these things. I need you to help me find a shadow lender. Baba doesn’t want me to do this, but I need to get enough to pay both fines and get Ivy and Sky out of custody.”

“Sky?” Sami pushed the broom around the room, and Li Jin noticed she still ignored Lan’s fussing from the cradle near the fireplace. “You haven’t said a word about him lately.”

Li Jin stopped what she was doing and put both palms on the counter, leaning forward toward Sami.

“How could I? My parents are worried sick about the twins. I’m not going to bother them about Sky. But I
am
worried. I asked Linnea and she said his grandfather won’t interfere, since he doesn’t agree with the Falun Gong philosophy. His mother doesn’t have any means to pay his fine, so Sky’s on his own. I don’t think anyone has even been to see him.”

She watched Sami’s face to see if she showed any concern over Sky. It was so hard to tell; Sami was so stingy with her feelings.

“And you’re willing to put up this place”—Sami waved her arm around the kitchen—“this happy little hovel—for them? I thought this was your dream to have something like this?”

Li Jin dropped her head and sighed. “It is. I don’t know what I’d do if we lost it. Jojo loves it here—I love it here, too. But I can’t just sit back and do nothing. Ivy is just as much their daughter as I am. I have to get her home. And after all, they put everything they had into helping me get this place.”

Lan let out a loud bellow and Sami returned to sweeping, ignoring the baby. “It would be nice to see Sky come home,” she said.

Li Jin watched her closely; yet she couldn’t tell if Sami really meant that or was just baiting her. Sometimes Sami acted like she was interested in Sky, but sometimes she didn’t. It drove Li Jin crazy but she would not ask her. She knew if she showed any interest in him at all, Sami would be on him like flies on pig dung.

Sami stopped and put both hands over the broom handle, propping her chin on top. “I’ll see what I can find out, but remember, if you don’t pay them back, they’ll have no mercy. They’ll evict you and all of your little beggars so fast it’ll make your head spin. Are you sure that’s what you want to do?”

Lan let out a heartier bellow and Sami went back to sweeping.

“I’m sure.” Li Jin felt a weight lifted from her. She’d made a decision. For once in her life someone besides her son needed her, and she was going to do what she could to help. It was scary, yet felt good. She just hoped she could come through. She put the last pot away and took off her apron, then crossed the kitchen to Lan. Lifting her, Li Jin held her to her shoulder and soothed her until the baby once again closed her eyes. She sighed with contentment as Lan relaxed to snuggle against her.
Sami didn’t know what she was missing,
she thought as she inhaled the little girl’s scent and headed for the bedroom to lay her down.

I
vy stood quietly in line, waiting her turn to use the bathroom. The nurse on duty had brought Scary Girl over to her when it was time for dinner rations and officially given the girl the responsibility to lead Ivy around, telling Ivy to call her Yao Mo before turning around and leaving them standing there. That was a shock, because in their local dialect
Yao Mo
was used to refer to someone from the dark underworld. Was the girl a witch? Ivy had felt a chill run up her spine when the girl didn’t object to the name, but instead stood staring at the floor in front of her, an eerie expression on her face.

Yao Mo had stayed sullen until the nurse left and even through their meager dinner of cold congee, but at least now she was attempting to act human. From the middle of the room, Ivy saw a woman making circles around the card table, moving quicker than seemed possible for her age. She panted heavily as she ran, never taking her eyes from her shoes.

“What is she doing?” Ivy said, then remembered she wasn’t supposed to be able to see. “I mean, I hear what sounds like someone running around the room?”

“We call her Crazy Coco. She thinks her shoes are talking to her. She makes circles around the table all day and when she gets going fast enough and she makes that sound you’re hearing, she says her shoes are telling her what to do to get out of here.”

Ivy looked from the corner of her eye without moving her head and immediately agreed with the nickname they’d given the woman. She
was
crazy.

“After bathroom break they’ll come in and give us our meds,” Yao Mo said. “Then we have an hour of free time before lights-out.”

“But I don’t take medication.”

“You will here. You either take it willingly or they’ll give it to you in a shot while three of the gorillas hold you down.”

“They’ll really do that?” Ivy felt the girl nudge her forward and she took a step closer to the door, stopping an inch or so behind the elderly woman in front of her.

“You’ll see. There are always a few here who want to do it the hard way. The attendants enjoy it, too—gives them their dose of power for the day.”

Finally it was Ivy’s turn and she held the door to allow the elderly woman out of the bathroom, then slowly went in.

“Do you need some help?” Yao Mo asked.

“No. I can find my way around,” Ivy answered, closing the door behind her. First the heavy smell of urine and feces took her breath. She slapped her hand over her mouth and nose and looked for a lock, but the knob didn’t have one. Glad to finally drop the blind act for a moment, she turned around. The bathroom was sparse, only a raised platform with a sewage drop in the floor, and a small pedestal sink. No shower and no mirror. Ivy grimaced at the mess left around the sewer hole. Unlike the bathroom she’d used in the other wing earlier, this one was filthy. Couldn’t the women hover over the hole? Did they have to just let their bowels go wherever?

Sighing in disgust, she held her pajama bottoms high enough not to touch the mess around the ceramic rim, and quickly did her business. She stood and waddled off the platform and away from the toilet to straighten her clothes. She turned on the spigot at the sink and ran her hands under the tiny stream of cold water, then shook the droplets off just as someone banged on the door.

“Kuai le!”
someone hollered, telling her to hurry, and she quickly opened the door.

“It wasn’t me,” said Yao Mo, her hands up as if she thought Ivy could see them. She nudged Ivy to the wall. “Just stand right here, and I’ll get you back in a second.”

Ivy let her eyes wander around the room, thankful again for the sunglasses as a camouflage hiding her curiosity. She had to admit, there were several women in the bathroom line and around the room that looked like they should be there. But to her surprise, there were also women who looked as sane as she or her Nai Nai, their eyes and expression like any Ivy would see on a daily basis in the outside world. What were these women in here for and where were their families? It was hard to take in, and she wished once again that someone would come for her and tell her she’d been sprung.

Yao Mo came out of the bathroom and took Ivy’s arm, then led her to her bed.

Surprisingly, Yao Mo said, “Wanna talk?”

Ivy wasn’t sure if she needed a friend who was branded as a witch, but she didn’t want to be left alone again. “Sure.”

She backed up and sat up on the bed and Yao Mo climbed up beside her.

“First, just call me Mo. Now, how did you end up here?” she asked.

Ivy took a deep breath. She had to be careful to tell the story as if she were Lily. She didn’t know Yao Mo enough to trust her.

“I was playing my violin in the park and got picked up and accused of being Falun Gong.”

Mo nodded. “There are plenty of your people in here. They’re a weird lot, never complaining about anything, even if they’re treated roughly.”

“They aren’t
my people
. I’m not part of that. I was wrongly accused.” Ivy couldn’t keep the irritation out of her voice. Just thinking about the way her sister was treated made her flush with anger.

“
Aiya,
fine. Whatever. I really don’t care. They call me worse, as you know.”

“So,
are
you a witch?” Ivy asked. Her curiosity outweighed her good manners.

Mo laughed quietly. “Let’s just say if I were a real witch, I’d cast a spell and get myself out of here. But I am interested in the subject. Enough that my father decided to put me in here to teach me a lesson.”

“Teach you a lesson?”

“Yeah.” Mo used her fingers to draw circles on the coverlet. “He said I needed to get help to get sorcery out of my head. He was suspicious about the black cat I made my pet last year, but when he found me reading a history book about the soul stealers scare in the eighteenth century, he flipped out. He’s very traditional.”

“Soul stealers?”

“It was started by a peasant who went to a mason known as a sorcerer to ask him to punish his nephews for terrorizing him. Word got out and the peasant was arrested for dealing with the occult. The mason disappeared, and soon the townspeople panicked and began to accuse anyone without a real place in society of being sorcerers.”

“That’s ridiculous,” Ivy said, picking at her nails.

“But it’s interesting—which is why I was reading the book. The townspeople went village to village and persecuted beggars, wanderers, trash collectors, and even monks. It was the first official Chinese witch hunt.”

Ivy’s eyebrows rose when the girl mentioned trash collectors. “And your Baba really thinks you’re a witch?”

Mo laughed as she played with her ponytail. “Probably now he does. I told him if he put me here, I’d curse him and his grandsons. And he doesn’t even have any yet.”

Ivy thought that was a little harsh, considering the superstitions of the elderly and their high hopes for future generations to do well, but the father should’ve tried to work out their disagreement rather than sending his daughter to a mental hospital. Ivy bet if it had been a son, he’d have received a slap on the wrist or been branded a scholar, instead of being sentenced behind bars.

Keys against the metal door saved her from responding and a nurse pushed a large cart into the room. Three muscular men dressed in white followed her in and stood behind her, arms crossed as if daring someone to defy them.

“There’s the Gang of Four,” Mo said, snickering quietly.

“That’s an ominous nickname,” Ivy mumbled low enough for only Mo to hear. The Gang of Four were what Mao’s personal team were called during the revolution. Composed of his wife and three of her most trusted cadres, they wielded extreme—and cruel—power for a time. When the revolution fizzled out, they were all arrested and died in disgrace for the way they treated the people during their short reign of terror. Usually their names were only invoked in terrible circumstances.

“They’ve earned it.” Mo slid off the bed and pulled at Ivy, urging her to her feet. “Let’s get it over with.”

Ivy let Mo lead her to the cart where they stood behind several patients already shuffling forward in a line. When they got to the nurse, Ivy pretended to stare right through her. Mo pushed her a little bit closer.

“She’s a new patient,” Mo said to the nurse.

“Name?” the nurse asked, obviously bored as she picked up her clipboard and pencil.

“Zheng I—Lily,” Ivy said.

The nurse skimmed down her paper, then marked it and picked up a small white paper cup of water and handed it to Ivy. Mo guided her hand to take it.

“Open up,” the nurse said without an ounce of compassion.

Ivy stood there, ignoring the command. Instead she held out her hand for the pill.

“Until they get to know you, they’ll put the pill in your mouth and then check to make sure you swallow it. Open your mouth.” Mo nudged her.

Ivy sighed. She didn’t see any way out of it. She was about to be drugged. She opened her mouth. The nurse put a tiny blue pill on it and then used her hand to quickly push Ivy’s jaw closed.

“Hurry up.”

Ivy turned the tiny bit of water up and swallowed, then opened her mouth and stuck her tongue out. The nurse nodded.

“Come on.” Mo grabbed her pill and water and guided Ivy back to her bed.

“What’s that going to do to me?”

“You’ll sleep through the night. Makes it easier for the staff if we are all drugged.”

“
Hao le,
are you ready for Mental Madness 101?” Mo crossed her legs Indian style and leaned against the metal frame that served as Ivy’s headboard.

“What do you mean?” Ivy sat opposite her, where Mo had led her after they’d gotten their medication. Around them the other patients—except for the lady still chasing her shoes around the table—were obviously winding down. Mo had brought her a cup of lukewarm tea and explained they weren’t allowed hot water because the manic patients might throw it on someone. Ivy drank the tea, but without the heat the tepid liquid didn’t bring her any comfort. She couldn’t help but feel a rush of anxiety at the thought of being locked in for the night with a bunch of strangers. She wished they’d left her in the room Lily had started in. At least there she’d have been alone behind a locked door.

They wasted a half hour or so talking back and forth and Ivy thought she felt the meds working. Either that or the excitement from being in a new place had just drained her. From the bed beside her a series of low snores began. Someone was already asleep. That fast!