Can Xue - The Last Lover

“Your house is truly beautiful, built here, like a kind of magic.” Joe gasped in admiration.

“That isn’t my house. I am no more than a guest.” Kim wrinkled his eyebrows as if lost in thought. “I’ve already told you, the house has no foundation. That is to say, it isn’t built up — it was originally here. You, for example, if you are willing, can become a tenant, too.”

“But I have my own house. My wife is named Maria. My son is named Daniel. I have to go out and sell clothing every day. I have to make a living.” Joe felt falseness in his voice.

Kim glanced at him, saying, “That won’t hinder you. Don’t you already practice the skill of reading at work? I, too, had a job originally. I was a gardening specialist.”

Joe thought of those insects with a burst of disgust, and he couldn’t help inquiring about them.

“The flower seeds had worms inside them to start. I only use special methods to make them develop. I love working in the greenhouse. When I was a horticulturalist I did only surface handiwork, but now my work grows more and more interesting. Have you seen a wild hare before? It has a battle of intelligence with the hawks. I sought the home of the hawks. I have never found it. It isn’t on the cliffs overhanging this mountain. It’s in a place no one has thought of. For example, the East.”

“Where do you buy the flower seeds from?”

“I don’t know. I found the nursery in the local newspaper. But the address was fake. There’s no such place in existence. The strange thing is that I sent a letter there, and they shipped me all varieties of seeds. This has something to do with my homeland. That’s how I think of it.”

Another day had passed. This place had no dusk, and night fell suddenly. In an instant, Joe could see nothing. Kim pulled him into the car. The car lights cut into the black in all directions as they drove ahead, and shortly they reached the house.

Kim’s pace quickened as he entered the dining room. Joe went in with him. They saw the cook lying as before on the floor. Kim bent down to look at her, saying to Joe, “She’s suffered a serious blow.” Then he went to the liquor cabinet and brought out the liquor they’d drunk earlier. He gave Joe a large glass. Joe drank a few mouthfuls, and saw the dark shadows appearing in the room. These shadows were all excessively large men, and their heads butted the ceiling. One of them stretched out his hand and smashed a basket filled with wasps over his head. Immediately the room filled with crazily flying wasps. Joe shed his coat and used it to wrap his head tightly. He squatted, leaning on the wall. He heard the fellow next to him say:

“It’s so comfortable. Why are there people who refuse this happiness?”

Joe suspected that the bodies of the men in the room must be crawling with venomous wasps because they were groaning as if in pain. Someone was yelling “Mama, get up,” probably referring to the cook. It did mean her, and Joe heard her roar, like the howl of a beast he couldn’t name, both painful and longing. Joe was deeply affected. He picked up his jacket and rose to his feet. There was no one in the room, only the black mass of wasps madly flying. His face swelled up before long, and his head felt dizzy. A pair of hands dragged him into the dining room. His eyes swelled into a narrow slit, and through the slit he saw the disheveled hair of the cook.

He was led into the guestroom, where a fragrant lotion was spread on his face.

“People who come here are never afraid of the wasp attacks.”

The one speaking was in fact Kim. Strangely enough, though, it was the cook who’d led Joe into the room.

“Where is the cook?” he asked.

“She’s still sleeping on the floor of the dining room, accepting the consolation of the wasps.”

Joe stroked his face, which was swollen out of recognition. He heard a beastlike howl again. Moreover, the cry was not the same as before: it was like the sound a beast made when baited. Kim also listened closely. He said, “The cook is the kind of woman who’s able to give up her life. Her homeland left her with a nightmare, for decades she’s lived inside a nightmare, and she told me she never wanted to wake up.” He also said, “She isn’t unable to speak — she isn’t willing to speak. Is it possible that someone able to howl like this would still be willing to speak? So she became a tenant here.”

Kim made him lie down on the bed, but the bed was already occupied by those black cats. There were more than ten altogether, squatting on top of the quilt. “There is no picking and choosing in life,” Kim said, at the same time pushing him toward the bed. Once Joe fell down, the cats crowded around and licked his face where it had been stung. Their scorching, prickly tongues made him extremely nauseous. He wanted to howl, too, and he did howl, twice.

“That’s right,” said Kim from off to the side.

He heard Kim quietly leaving, shutting the door to the room. But he did not go. He spoke with someone at the door. Every time Kim’s voice rose a little, the cats crazily licked Joe’s face. Two of them even tried to bite his cheeks and wrists. So he dared to howl twice again. Joe had never liked to go too near cats, and when he was at home he felt that these somber animals hid an incalculable will. But now his whole body, from head to toe, lacked strength. He was oppressively tired and could only let them manipulate him. He did receive one benefit: the pain in the stung places lessened.

He couldn’t remember when he went to sleep. On entering a dream the feeling of nausea disappeared. There was someone beside him who urged him to go look at the snow lotuses and, without reflecting, he went with him. The two men climbed the mountain on a single road. The mountain was steep and slippery, requiring both hands and feet in many places. At his side Kim cautioned, “Meet a man and casually go along with him, and in the long run you will be the one who meets with disaster.” Joe disregarded the question of whether there would be a disaster, because once they reached the steep slope, if he drew back he would have fallen into a bottomless abyss. But he couldn’t go up either. There was some object tangled around his foot. The man turned his head to tell him two cats were tangling up his feet, and added that if he’d escaped those two cats when he was at home, with his wife, Maria, all would be well. Now it was too late. “That time when you ate turkey, why didn’t you think of what the cats wanted?” The fellow, with his head wrapped in a scarf and his face obscured, started to complain to Joe. Joe felt his feet slipping down. He couldn’t stop, he simply closed his eyes and didn’t mind anything. .

Joe sat in the back seat of a taxi. He lay down and pulled the horror novel out of his leather briefcase, turning to the first page. The novel’s conclusion suddenly appeared between the written lines. A white-haired Hailin sat in the kitchen peeling potatoes. A vampire spied on her from outside the window. Hailin raised her head, saw the vampire. Her eyeballs suddenly couldn’t move. Later she discovered that, aside from her eyeballs not moving, her body was unaffected. She had no discomfort. She still peeled the potatoes, took out the roasted fish and put it on the plate, and decorated it with cherries. Passing through the drawing room, she unintentionally looked at the mirror and discovered blood dripping from the corners of her mouth. Her neighbors opened the door and came in, letting out surprised cries and then hurriedly fleeing. Hailin thought she had probably changed into a vampire. With this thought, she had a feeling of freedom.

“Reading that kind of book on a journey is not a good idea.” The driver spoke without turning his head.

“Why do I feel like the car is going back and forth, and still hasn’t left the pastureland?” Joe asked.