Ran Chen - A Private Life

He wanted to meet me up in my apartment, then go out together, but I thought it precipitous to invite him home like that, and besides, it wouldn't be good with Mother still not feeling well. So I arranged a time to wait for him downstairs.

That winter was unusually mild, and the weekend was gorgeously warm and sunny. At ten o'clock sharp, wearing a cashmere cardigan and carrying a down jacket under my arm, I went downstairs.

Before leaving the apartment I had stood in front of the mirror carefully assessing how I looked. I tried on, took off, tried on, took off a string of things, finally settling on the silver-gray cardigan.

I noticed that my body, which was once as thin as a sheet of paper, and my arms and legs, the Misses Do and Don't of my childhood, once skinny as sticks, had filled out, and that my breasts had been swelling quietly to fullness beneath my blouse. As I looked closely at this young but very beautiful girl in the mirror, I saw her suddenly turn away, and when she turned back again she had taken off all her clothes, or, I should say, they had simply disappeared. Her naked figure was flagrantly bared in the mirror, her deep red nipples glowing as if bathed in sunlight, her smooth white breasts following my eyes like a pair of plump sunflowers following the sun.

I was quite aware of my own narcissistic tendencies, but what followed caught me completely off guard, even shocked me.

I saw my body, frail as a feather, floating lightly toward me from a fog-enshrouded horizon. Whimpering helplessly with tears streaming down my face, I was in the arms of someone who looked exactly like Yin Nan. He was gently caressing my cheeks and my forehead in an attempt to soothe me. The touch of his breast ignited in me an overwhelming desire to be his prisoner. I had never before been embraced by anyone so young, nor had I ever before felt the desire to lose myself like this. I nestled in the mysterious greenish-blue aura of light that seemed to issue from his arms, in the overbrimming vitality of his youth. Yet his youthfulness made me feel uneasy.

Then I heard a voice that sounded exactly like Yin Nan's saying, "You're not at all like the others."

I said, "You've found out?"

The voice said, "You captivate me. You're pure and noble."

I said, "I'm not the least bit pure. You have no idea what kind of person I am."

The voice said, "I understand you."

I said, "You don't understand me. You have no idea how shameless I have been in the face of desire."

The voice said, "I like your shameless innocence."

I said, "You can't understand me. You're too young. And I am already old beyond my years."

The voice said, "I understand you. I've known you for a long time, and I've never stopped watching you."

I said, "Watching what?"

The voice said, "Your cheeks, your eyes, your lips, your breasts…"

Then I felt his gentle, cool fingertips lightly touching and caressing my face and my breasts…

A feeling of faintness overcame me, and I struggled to open my eyes.

I saw my own hands caressing the naked body of the young girl in the mirror…

At exactly ten o'clock I went downstairs. Yin Nan was already waiting for me at the entrance to the stairwell.

I went a few steps closer and said, "Have you been waiting long?"

He didn't say anything, just gave a secretive little chuckle.

He led me over to an inky black Imperial sedan and, opening the right front door, said, "Jump in."

I was rather surprised, because I couldn't see a driver anywhere, and there was no taxi sign. Feeling a bit puzzled, I climbed into the car and sat down.

By this time Yin Nan had already gone around to the other side, slid into the driver's seat, closed the door, and started the engine.

Watching in total astonishment, I asked him, "The car – did you drive it here? Can you drive?"

Cocky and secretly pleased with himself, he ignored my questions.

Following the sun-mottled streets, the car left our neighborhood behind and moved quickly out onto the multiple-laned Third Ring Road, where it quickly accelerated. We flashed past the roadside shops, trees, and scattered residential buildings. When I saw that the speedometer had already hit 140 kilometers per hour, I began to feel a bit uneasy.

I said, "Don't go so fast. We could have an accident."

Saying nothing, not even turning his head, Yin Nan kept his eyes on the road as we raced along.

I was starting to feel afraid.

I knew that he had carefully planned everything that day to show off his driving skills and impress me with his speed.

So I said, "Okay. You've already scared me stiff."

But only when we were turning off onto a side street did he finally slow down.

It was a small and very quiet road that connected with the city's eastern suburbs. The sun was shining directly into my face, so I cupped one hand over my eyes to block the piercing light.

Then I noticed that he had moved over as close as possible to the edge of the road to get us into the shade. His thoughtfulness touched me.

Dropping my hand, I said, "You needn't worry. It's just that the sun's a bit bright."

He said, "We better stay in the shade as much as possible. With your hand forever hoisted up like that, you look like you're saluting a military review."

I started to laugh. This was the first time I had seen his sense of humor.

We continued to drive. Gradually the city's variety of sights and noisy flow of people fell away, and on either side we began to see fields lying fallow, storage sheds, and run-down cottages that looked a bit like old-fashioned thatched huts.

We conversed very little along the way. I didn't feel like showing my curiosity about such things as his driving or whose car it was. I was totally engrossed in watching his every action as he drove, afraid that I might miss something – so much so that I began to feel faint from eye-strain and had to close my eyes and lean back against the seat and rest for a while before I began to recover. I was as serious as if I were a driving school student studying for my test.

When I closed my eyes to relax a bit, I felt Yin Nan pull the car over to the edge of the road, stop, shut off the engine, then turn to me.

"Do you feel sick?" he asked solicitously.

I said, "No. It's just that my eyes are a bit blurry."

"Then we'll rest for a while," he said, turning on the radio. As coincidence would have it, they were playing a song I loved very much – "The End of the World."

This kind of soft-edged sentimentality could no longer stir me to tears. I simply listened quietly, feeling a bit sad.

I opened my eyes and looked out the car window at the golden sunlight streaming after the withered leaves as they raced across the ground. The bright light and the brilliant yellows pierced my eyes like hot flames. My eyes smarted, filling with tears, and I wiped them away with my fingers.

Noticing this, Yin Nan turned his head inquisitively to look at me.

After a moment he said, "You're not crying, are you?"

I said, "Don't be stupid. There's something bothering my eyes."

Then we fell silent, listening quietly to the song.

As we listened, there must have been something that somehow touched me, for I was struck with an inexplicable grief that reduced me to tears, real tears whose flow I could not stem, and the more I cried, the more intense this grief became.

Even today, I still have no idea what was behind those tears. But I do know that they had little, if anything, to do with Yin Nan and me.