Daniel Rose - Larry's Kidney, Being the True Story of How I Found Myself in China

Abu, my Pakistani friend, has apparently been celebrating his birthday for three days. “Twenty-six years of age!” he boasts, accepting a soup bowl of cake that his mother offers with lowered eyes. “New cake every day!”

After receiving a short scolding from her son about too much frosting, the mother mutely sidles off to resume prayers on her little mat.

“Tomorrow we cut the cake again, four days!” he promises me.

“I’ll be here,” I say.

“So now I show you better exercise?” Abu asks me.

“Depends what you have in mind,” I say.

“You are familiar with the Vespa motor phenomenon?”

“Minimally.”

“Come with me.”

And for the next three hours, he rides me around on the back of his Vespa motor phenomenon, showing me a city I didn’t know existed. Muslim restaurants. Breweries and textile factories. Massage parlors conducted by blind men, who’re alleged to have more sensitive fingertips. Massage parlors that specialize in foot rubs with flaming glass cups placed against the soles to stimulate circulation. Massage parlors that-

“Why does your hat not fly off?” Abu calls to me from the front.

“It’s well trained. It knows it won’t get dessert tonight if it misbehaves,” I call back.

Laughing, Abu guns it. Last stop is an antique skyscraper hotel with a crenellated castle roof, glimpsed between cloud banks of smog. Abu instructs me to walk through the lobby as though we own the place, straight to the elevator, up to the top floor where there’s a stuffy old gym, 1920s vintage. A small swimming pool whose green water looks like it hasn’t been rippled since talkies were invented. A wooden contraption with rollers to wring the water from bathing suits. A machine you stand in that’s supposed to cook the pounds off, probably banned in the United States a century ago. And a stationary bike that feels like you’re riding a manual typewriter. But it works. The whole place is like an aboveground dungeon, with tiny windows of leaded glass through which I can see the city operating below like a toy-train village with thousands of whirring parts, all its flywheels and cogs clicking in sync. When the windows are cranked shut, it’s as if a mute button has been pushed. Blessed silence reigns: no more raucously melodious street cries, no more unstoppable firecrackers. Best of all, no more Larry-Mary noise. The only sound is Abu expertly penetrating the green water as he practices his half gainers from the diving board, slick and quiet as a coin entering a pay phone. It’s enough to bring me back the next afternoon, and the next. Every silent hour I spend up here, daydreaming to my heart’s content, is one I don’t spend with the non-silent hyphenate next door.

Then one night a phone call I wasn’t expecting.

“Huwwo?”

“Huwwo.”

“Huwwo?”

“Yes, is this Larry?”

“Yes, Dan, what do you need?”

“I don’t need anything. You just called me.”

“No, you just called me.”

Beat, garbled.

“Oh, I’m sorry, Dan, Mary is telling me that she called you. She just woke me up and handed the phone to me.”

“Well, why did Mary call?”

“I’ll ask her. Mary, why did you call Dan and hand the phone to me?…Not yes, Mary. That’s not an answer to why did you call…”

“Larry-”

“Not sure, Mary. Not uh-huh, Mary. Why. Did. You. Call. Dan.”

“Larry, does Mary need something from me?”

“I know he’s my cousin, Mary. Mary, stop! I don’t want a pedicure! [Garbled] Because I don’t care for a pedicure, Mary, it’s as simple as that.”

“Larry, listen, why don’t you call me back when you get this straightened-”

“I am being patient, Mary. Do you hear me raising my voice, Mary? Do you see me raising my fist?”

“Larry, it’s four in the morning. Can we maybe resume this another-”

“DAN!? DAN!?”

“Yes, Mary,” I say as Mary takes the phone, “there’s no need to shout.”

“DAN!? LARRY NOT MARRY ME!”

“He’s not marrying you, Mary?”

“NOT MARRY ME AT ALL!”

“Okay, Mary, let’s talk about this in the morn-”

[Click.]

Knock-knock. In the morning I go to Larry’s room, and we do talk about it-a powwow between distant allies who have no particular warmth to pool but do have business to conduct. Then again, Larry’s room has a lot of warmth to pool.

“So the bridesmaids’ dresses are on hold?” I ask, fanning myself with both hands, kicking pistachio shells out of the way as I sit on the molded-plastic school chair.

“Don’t get me wrong. Compatibility remains high,” Larry says in a monotone that’s more mono than usual. “As a matter of fact, I believe I may be falling for her, somewhat violently. Just look at her preparing my pistachios. She lines up the piles so all I have to do is delve. I’d like nuffing better than to do right by her, marriage-wise. It’s only the trust issue I’m continuing to monitor.”

“Anything in particular bothering you?”

“Not to the best of my knowledge,” he says, squirting back a blast of nasal spray and blinking at me blankly.

“But I mean, you wanted to talk-”

“Oh, I see,” he says, his concentration coming back. “Yes, in that case, one thing. As you may or may not know, Mary is very diligently studying the English workbooks I got her. But the other day I offered to buy her English-language CDs that she could play on her computer at home, and she told me she didn’t have a computer.”

“I fail to see the signifi-”

“Dan, don’t you remember? I sent her three hundred and fifty dollars to buy a used laptop a year ago. It was one of the first transactions between us, and she was most appreciative.”

“Oh,” I say, my heart sinking. “I see. So you’re saying-”

“That she pocketed my money.”

Why do I feel my heart aching? Not because I like Mary so much, but because Larry was so happy with her for a time. I could count the missing teeth in his smile! Wouldn’t it have been great if she and Larry could wander off into the sunset together, arm in arm? The Larry-Mary military-industrial complex forever?

“I’d like to work things out between us, but only if I conclude she’s not using me to ride my passport to the promised land. And for my part, I want to make sure I’m falling for her for the right reasons, not only for the way she tends to my laundry needs, though she continues to do that like nobody’s business, including my most intimate apparel.”

“But if she does your knickers while taking you to the cleaners, that doesn’t seem to be a very good trade, Larry.”

“But I’m impaired! I’m not sure I can trust my judgment. Am I genuinely fond of her, or am I only rescuing her to assuage the guilt I feel for letting Judy slip away?”

I don’t know: The whole Judy question is a difficult one for me. As is the question of how comfortable Mary has become with me-comfortable enough to sit there wearing pantyhose with no skirt so I can’t help seeing that her panties are valentine red. A new tune warbles forth from the softspeakers: Jack and Jill went up the hill to fetch a pail of water…

“Is she still giving your credit card a good workout?” I ask.

“I don’t mind her using my credit card. In fact, I encourage it.”

“Because it’ll atrophy if it isn’t exercised daily?”

“Ha ha, good one,” he says without smiling.

I look at Mary dividing the pistachios into various piles for Larry to enjoy. “Larry, I have to tell you, all you’re saying sends up red flags to me. Did it ever occur to you that she might have stolen your passport that first week, sold it to the black market, or worse?”

“What, identity theft? No, I have to admit that never occurred to me, but it’s not that far-fetch-”