Wang Anyi - The Song of Everlasting Sorrow

“Did you have something to eat, Auntie?” Xiao Lin asked after taking a moment to compose himself.

Wang Qiyao, however, responded with silence, pretending not to hear him. She kept her eyes on the comic book and turned the pages with a smile on her face. Weiwei grabbed some clothing and went into the bathroom to change as Xiao Lin said, “This afternoon we’re going to see the bamboo groves at Yellow Dragon Cave. Why don’t you come along!”

“I’m not going!” Wang Qiyao replied, the smile on her face suddenly vanishing.

Xiao Lin paused a moment before he tried to explain. “This morning Weiwei and I went for a walk along Su Causeway. We ended up pretty far out and that’s why we didn’t make it back for breakfast.”

Wang Qiyao could no longer contain the bitterness welling up inside her. Her eyes turned red and she struggled before responding, “Well, I also went out for a walk.”

As soon as the words came out of her mouth she got angry at herself for showing her weakness. “You need not report to me,” she added.

At that point Weiwei emerged from the bathroom and asked, “Are we going or not?”

She directed her question at Xiao Lin and didn’t even look at Wang Qiyao, as if there was no such person in the room.

Looking up from her comic book, Wang Qiyao demanded, “Who are you talking to?”

Weiwei was taken off guard. She rolled her eyes. “I wasn’t talking to you.”

Wang Qiyao flashed a cold smile. “If you’re not talking to me, then just who are you talking to? What makes you think that just because you have a man you can ignore everyone else? You think men are reliable? Just you wait, one day they’ll step all over you and you’ll come running back to me. Maybe you don’t believe what I’m telling you, but just you wait!”

Her comments, which seemed to come totally out of the blue, caused Weiwei to panic. “Who’s got a man?” she retorted. “And who’s the one ignoring everyone else? Today I’m going to set the record straight! And I’m not going to Yellow Dragon Cave either!”

With that, she sat down on the other bed, folded her legs, and stared at Wang Qiyao, affecting the posture of one ready to settle scores. The two of them always treated each other as equals, rather than as mother and daughter; the fact that Wang Qiyao looked so young was not the only reason people took them for sisters. They quarreled frequently, so that even an outsider like Xiao Lin had witnessed their bickering on more than one occasion. But today the scene was something out of the ordinary. It seemed to have come out of nowhere, and even when there was nothing left to argue about they were both determined to carry on. In fact, trouble had been brewing for some time, and Xiao Lin, conscious of the great embarrassment a full-blown eruption would cause all three of them, went over to pull Weiwei away. But she knocked his hands aside.

“You’re always taking her side! Just what is she to you?” Before Weiwei could finish the sentence, her mother slapped her across the face.

Weiwei was brassy enough to exchange harsh words with her mother, but she was far from the point of being able to trade blows. Beside herself with rage, she could only take refuge in tears. Xiao Lin tried to pull her away, but she only sobbed, “The two of you are ganging up on me!”

No one went out that afternoon. The beautiful sunny day, amidst the gorgeous scenery of lake and mountain, passed by under the shadow of anger, tears, and resentment.

Xiao Lin’s roommate wasn’t around, so he took Weiwei back to his room, where he did everything he could to console her and try to cheer her up. After a great deal of whimpering, Weiwei gradually calmed down.

“Xiao Lin,” Weiwei raised her teary eyes and gazed at her boyfriend. “You be the judge: was all this my fault or hers?”

Xiao Lin wiped away her tears. “What’s all this talk about ‘my fault or hers’? It’s your mother we’re talking about! Even if she was wrong, she’s still your mother.”

Weiwei was upset again. “So, according to you, there is no such thing as right or wrong in the world?”

Xiao Lin laughed. “I wasn’t talking about the rest of the world!” He was silent for a moment before continuing, “You know, there is something quite sad about your mother.”

“What’s so sad about her?” Not wanting to risk a row, Xiao Lin stared blankly out the window. It was only after a brief pause that Weiwei turned him around and asked, “Are you in a relationship with her or with me?”

Weiwei’s stern expression gave the ludicrous question a serious tone. Xiao Lin kissed her. “Is it really necessary for me to answer that question?”

Weiwei laughed, and then became embarrassed. She hid her head under a pillow and wouldn’t let Xiao Lin look at her. The two of them kept on like this and the time slipped away. Before long it was dinner time.

“Let’s go down and get her for dinner. But you have to try and smile!” he said.

Weiwei intentionally drew a long face. “I don’t know how to smile.”

Just as they were getting ready to leave, there was a knock on the door. It was Wang Qiyao. She had changed clothes, had her handbag with her, and looked perfectly serene. She said she wanted to take them out for dinner at the Louwailou and waited patiently for them to collect their things.

The sun was hanging low over the streets, bathing all of Hangzhou in a golden glow. Bicycles glided by as if they too were fish swimming in the shining lake. The few boats remaining on the water drifted to the shore, where they seemed to exchange glances of surprise with the pedestrians. Soon the sky turned a gorgeous hue, dyeing the clouds on the horizon a rainbow of brilliant colors. It was so beautiful that Xiao Lin decided to take some photographs, including shots of the women, singly and together. After the colors had faded from the firmament, they proceeded to the restaurant and sat down to dinner. Wang Qiyao let the two of them order and refrained from interfering. Gradually Weiwei became her old vivacious self. She grew talkative and Wang Qiyao chimed in a few times, putting what had happened earlier that afternoon behind them. Only then did Xiao Lin, who had been walking on pins and needles all day, finally heave a sigh of relief.

“Weiwei,” Xiao Lin said earnestly as he poured out the beer, “you should toast your mother. It mustn’t have been easy raising a girl like you!”

“That was her decision,” Weiwei rejoined perversely. “It’s not as if I forced her!”

Wang Qiyao laughed. “All right, so I forced you, okay?”

“Here’s to Auntie, who really broke the bank paying for this vacation!” Xiao Lin exclaimed.

He had not expected his words to make Wang Qiyao blanch. Although she managed to hold on to her smile, her expression changed, growing colder. She took a sip of beer and, without saying anything, began to eat. Weiwei naturally didn’t notice anything wrong, but Xiao Lin felt uneasy, sensing he had said something wrong — only he wasn’t sure what. He was already exhausted from having spent most of the day trying to patch things up between the mother and daughter, and now it all seemed to have been a wasted effort. Disheartened, he addressed himself to the food and drink. Only Weiwei was still in high spirits, blithely unaware that anything was different. In the end, she was the only one who enjoyed the meal.

That night Wang Qiyao returned alone to her room and, for lack of something else to do, began packing her things for the return trip the following day. In the middle of her packing she suddenly smiled, thinking, So he thinks of me as his private bank! Then, after a pause, And what does she take me for? Putting down her things, she decided to take a shower. It was too early for hot water and all that came out of the shower head was air. Forgetting to turn it off, she lay down on the bed and dozed off. She awoke to the sound of rushing water and clouds of steam billowing out from the bathroom door.