Xiaobin Xu - Crystal Wedding

Suddenly, to Tianyi’s complete bemusement, Niuniu stood up and left. The waitress watched in disbelief. Tianyi was slow to react, but eventually she sprang to her feet and ran after him. Reason deserted her. When she caught up with him she slapped his face.

This was the first occasion she had ever hit her son. The first and only. Time froze.

He was a grown-up now. They stared at each other. She was a whole head shorter than him. All her anguish and resentment had turned to anger. His glasses had fallen to the ground, and passers-by were staring at them. Her son was desperate to appear macho, but his utter humiliation made him cry. Not even this softened her. She shouted, ‘OK, go! Take yourself off wherever you want!’

She felt like she was going to collapse. She had no idea how she got home that day. The only thing she knew was that Lian was away on business. He was using the trip to delay the divorce proceedings, having had second thoughts.

She looked at herself in the mirror and wondered how she could have aged so much in only a few short days. But she felt no pity for herself, or indeed anyone else just now.

Suddenly she remembered the fortune-teller who had told her she would marry the man she met on the tenth of October, 1984. Why hadn’t she said how long they would be married? Or when they would divorce?

She rested her head against the mirror, completely spent. Then a piece of paper caught her eye. She picked it up. It read, ‘Wedding Anniversaries: Year One, Paper: First joined, the bond thin as paper; Year Two, Poplar: Drifting like the leaves of a poplar tree …’ and so on. Her eyes scanned the page until ‘Year Fifteen’ caught her eye. ‘Crystal: Lustrous, bright and dazzling.’ She stared at it blankly. 1984 to 1999, fifteen years. A lustrous, bright and dazzling crystal wedding! The name was lovely, but surely glass would have been a better name? So very breakable.

At half past ten, her son came home. His glasses were askew, he was holding his school bag slung over one shoulder, and he looked subdued. It was obvious he knew he had been in the wrong. She acted as if nothing had happened. ‘Help yourself to the food in the wok,’ she said quietly. ‘Then have a wash and get ready for bed.’

He grunted in reply and went to eat. He ate and ate. She stood watching him, as she had done now for many years. She was used to it, liked watching her husband and son eat. They enjoyed her food. But to her, no matter how good it was, it tasted like candlewax.

She spread out the quilt on her son’s bed and then got her marriage certificate out of the drawer. She needed it for the divorce. She needed to get all the documents ready, so that Lian had no excuse to back out. Once she made up her mind to do something, not even a team of oxen could pull her off course.

Before long, her son was asleep and snoring peacefully. She sat on the edge of the bed and looked at him, surprised that this little boy had grown up so quickly. A fuzz of whiskers was visible on his upper lip. He had his own fate, his own tomorrow, one that the people who had given him life were powerless to change. Not long ago he was kicking his little legs so hard she could hardly get his socks on. She still had those little pocket-sized blue socks in a drawer somewhere, but now they would only cover one of his toes. The tears started to flow.

It was two o’clock in the morning. In her room, she picked up the mirror again. There was nothing, just her tear-stained, puffy face. Then she caught sight of their wedding photo hanging on the wall behind her. The happiness they had shared then was long gone. Had it ever been real?

Happiness was this fragile. Fragile as crystal and glass, breaking when you touched it. No wonder they called it a crystal wedding.

She recalled what Di had said to her on the pier in Wan Chai. ‘Ten years, ten of the best years of my life, all for a resident’s permit. By the time I got a Hong Kong resident’s permit the island belonged to the mainland again. What was the point?’

Xian had changed too, morphed into a frustrated spinster. When Tianyi saw her now, she always said she had too much on. Sometimes Tianyi was tempted to say, ‘I know you’re too busy to talk to me, but do stop throwing yourself at men.’ Of course she did not say that.

The three girls had known each other since they were little. Found boyfriends, got married, divorced, one after the other. God had given them life and time to do things, but what on earth was it all for?

Why was she surprised? What were human beings when measured against infinity? They were so small, helpless, rudderless, fickle, anguished, stressed, depressed, deviant, useless, vacillating, acquiescent, self-betraying, self-negating, vile … She was all of these things herself. So was Di, and Xian, and Lian. Even Zheng, she thought.

She looked at her world-weary, battle-scarred reflection for a long while. Then, she felt a grim determination grow within her — she would endure, no matter what. As she sat thinking, the room seemed to grow brighter around her, to fill with a brightness like the lustre given off by a huge piece of uncut crystal.