Ha Jin - A Good Fall

She remained silent and knew that something had happened to his marriage. Before she could ask, he hung up. She turned tearful and went to the law firm’s bathroom to compose herself.

Later, through a mutual acquaintance, she found out that Panbin had granted his wife the divorce and the custody of their child. Over the past five years he’d sent his wife more than seventy thousand dollars, which made her rich; even after paying off her mortgage, she still had a good sum in the bank. Crushed, Panbin rarely stepped out of his house these days except when he had to go to work. Lina also learned that some young women had been recommended to him, but he wouldn’t meet with any of them. He just said he wouldn’t date a Chinese woman again. He seemed to have changed and now avoided people he once knew.

Soon after taking all the tests, Zuming found a job at the martial arts institute called Wu Tang on Parsons Boulevard. He was hired as an assistant instructor, mainly tutoring a tai chi class. Lina was amazed, although it was a part-time job that required Zuming to mop the floors and clean the restrooms as well. He was a survivor, full of vitality.

In late June a university in Louisiana notified him that its one-year MBA program had admitted him. Lina knew he’d planned for a more expensive school, but he’d missed most of the application deadlines. He jumped at the late admission; he wanted to go. She felt he’d begun leaving her. God knew what would happen in New Orleans once he was there. After he had his degree, where would he go? Back to China, where a U.S. MBA was worth a lot and he had already built up a business network? That was unlikely. He would probably start a career here, even though Wall Street might be beyond his reach.

She felt wretched but had no one to talk to. If only Panbin were still around. He used to listen so quietly and attentively that she had often wondered if he fell asleep as she was speaking. Afterward he would help her figure out what to do and whom to see. He was full of strategies and, despite his training in computer science, loved reading practical philosophy, especially Machiavelli and a modern book on the ways of the world titled The Art of the Shameless .

One Saturday afternoon in early July, Lina took a shower, let her hair fall loosely on her shoulders, slipped on a pastel blue dress that highlighted her slender waist, and went to Panbin’s house as if she just happened to be passing by. He answered the door and looked surprised, but let her in. He was a lot thinner, yet spirited as before.

“Tea or coffee?” he asked her when they’d entered the living room.

“Coffee, please.” She sat down on the love seat, which felt as familiar as if it belonged to her. The room with bay windows was the same, except for the floor, which had been recently waxed and was shiny throughout. He seemed to be doing fine.

He put a cup of coffee in front of her and sat down. “Well, why did you come to see me?” he asked in a flat voice.

“Is it illegal?” She tilted her oval face, her chin pointed at him as she smiled, her lips curling a little.

“I thought you’d already washed your hands of me.”

“I’m still worried about you.”

“No need. I’m tough and I know how to get by.”

“Zuming’s going to New Orleans in a couple of weeks.”

“So? What does that have to do with me?”

She tittered. “Didn’t you used to feel you too were my husband?”

“That was four months ago when I still had my family.”

“You feel differently about me now?”

“Things have changed and I’ve changed too. My wife found the love of her life and took my son away from me. That almost killed me, but I resurrected myself and have become a different man.”

“How different?”

“I’m going to Kiev to see my girlfriend next week.”

“Your girlfriend?”

“Yes, I got to know her online.”

Lina couldn’t help but sneer. “So you want to become an international womanizer?”

“Oh, you can call me a cosmopolitan playboy, but I don’t give a damn. From now on I won’t date a Chinese woman again. Just sick of it — every Chinese has so much baggage of the past, too heavy for me to share and carry. I want to live freely and fearlessly with nothing to do with the past.”

“Without the past, how can we make sense of now?”

“I’ve come to believe that one has to get rid of the past to survive. Dump your past and don’t even think about it, as if it never existed.”

“How can that be possible? Where did you get that stupid idea?”

“That is the way I want to live, the only way to live. If you hadn’t worried so much about all the ties to your past, you wouldn’t have left me, would you? That’s the reason I’ve been dating a Ukranian woman, who is lovely.”

“She just wants to get a green card; she can’t be serious about a yellow man. Even if she agrees to marry you, she might not give you children. Or maybe you’ll dump her once you’re done toying with her.”

“That’s not something for you to speculate about. Didn’t you do that to me? Anyway, you mustn’t think ill of my girlfriend. I believe in names. Do you know any woman named Olga who is an adventuress?”

She laughed. “You’re so silly. You haven’t even met her yet, but you call her your girlfriend. Doesn’t she have siblings?”

“She has a younger brother, she told me.”

“Doesn’t she have parents?”

“She does, and grandparents.”

“See, are those not a kind of baggage? The same sort of past as we have?”

Stumped, he looked at his wristwatch and stood. “I have to go to the UPS store.”

She got to her feet too and refrained from saying she wished to remain his friend, but told him she missed his cooking, to which he didn’t respond. She lifted the cold coffee and downed it to the last drop, then stepped out of his house without another word. She wasn’t sure how serious he was about Olga or whether he’d bought the plane tickets for Kiev. Maybe he couldn’t help but act out of character. Whatever he might do, she hoped he wouldn’t make a fool of himself.

WHEN MY ROOMMATE MOVED OUT, I was worried that Mrs. Chen might increase the rent. I had been paying three hundred dollars a month for half a room. If my landlady demanded more, I would have to look for another place. I liked this colonial house. In front of it stood an immense weeping cherry tree that attracted birds and gave a bucolic impression, though it was already early summer and the blossoming season had passed. The house was close to downtown Flushing, and you could hear the buzz of traffic on Main Street. It was also near where I worked, convenient for everything. Mrs. Chen took up the first floor; my room was upstairs, where three young women also lived. My former roommate, an apprentice to a carpenter, had left because the three female tenants were prostitutes and often received clients in the house. To be honest, I didn’t feel comfortable about that either, but I had grown used to the women, and especially liked Huong, a twiggy Vietnamese in her early twenties whose parents had migrated to Cholon from China three decades ago, when Saigon fell and the real estate market there became affordable. Also, I had just arrived in New York and at times found it miserable to be alone.

As I expected, Mrs. Chen, a stocky woman with a big mole beside her nose, came up that evening. She sat down, patted her dyed hair, and said, “Wanping, now that you’re using this room for yourself we should talk about the rent.”

“I’m afraid I can’t pay more than what I’m paying. You can get another tenant.” I waved at the empty bed behind her.

“Well, I could put out an ad for that, but I have something else in mind.” She leaned toward me.