Tie Ning - The Bathing Women

Wu said, “I have not been making the milk overflow my whole life. Exaggerating other people’s shortcomings is your favourite hobby.”

Yixun suddenly laughed triumphantly. “Okay, okay, at last you admit that you have shortcomings. With your own words you yourself prove that I haven’t been making things up out of nothing. And as far as exaggeration is concerned, it’s your speciality.”

Wu said, “I have never exaggerated your shortcomings, it’s you who love to do that to me. Take, for example, time. I’m not very smart, so it does take me longer to get things done, but it’s nothing like what you claim. Every time I wash vegetables, you watch me so closely and then say you don’t understand why it takes me fifteen minutes to wash a tomato, but it doesn’t take me fifteen minutes.”

Yixun appealed to Tiao. “Listen to her, listen to her. Now you know who’s exaggerating. Your mum said I watched her ‘every time’ she washed vegetables. ‘Every time,’ would that be possible? As if I had nothing better to do! I’d prefer to look at something more beautiful if I had that kind of time.”

“I understand what you mean. So go and find someone more beautiful,” Wu said.

“If I want to, I will. I don’t need you to tell me. Your disrespect for yourself alone would make me want to.”

“How do I disrespect myself? Tell me, how do I disrespect myself?”

“You don’t respect your own face … Do you want me to continue?”

Wu rushed toward Yixun; frustrated, she seemed about to push him, but turned instead to the embarrassing pot of milk, raised it to her mouth, and drank up the milk. The pronounced gulping irritated Yixun to the point that he had to shut his eyes. When he opened them, Wu had disappeared. She’d locked herself in her bedroom.

Tiao and Yixun were left sitting at the dinner table, face to face.

He said to Tiao, “Why didn’t you say anything? How did you get so above it all?”

“It’s not that I’m above it all. It’s how extreme you are.”

“Are you still holding a grudge against me for criticizing Chen Zai? Then you’re being unfair.”

“No, I’m not holding a grudge. I understand you.”

“Then why didn’t you speak up for me?”

Tiao went quiet. Yixun’s fault-finding made his own flaws obvious to Tiao, but she didn’t want to be the referee between her parents. She loved them, loved this man and woman who had been fighting all their lives. Today she loved them more than ever. Life owed them something and she owed them, too, and now she finally realized it. She realized strongly how they needed to be loved. From now on, she wouldn’t demand that they understand her; she wanted to have a heart big enough to understand them.

The more they failed to understand her, the more she would attempt to understand them.

She received several phone calls from Chen Zai. On hearing his voice, she couldn’t help the tears welling up in her eyes. He asked to talk to her again; he said he must. He asked her whether they could talk. He said that he had to talk to her.

So she went back to her own apartment, the place where she’d lived with Chen Zai, where they had made love. In the living room, she sat waiting for him, and he took her in his arms as soon as he walked in. Meekly, she snuggled into him, resting her head in the nest of his shoulder, which fit her perfectly. He bound her tightly with his strong arms as if he wanted to crush her. He kissed her crazily, saying, “Let me look at you. Let me look at you.” But he couldn’t care less about looking at her, because he had to kiss her. He kissed her and said repeatedly, “My little sweet one, I can’t leave you, I really can’t leave you!” He sucked her tongue, and his strength forced her head back as if she were going to fall into an abyss. Then he suddenly grabbed her around the waist and lifted her head. Gasping, she said, “Come to me, come to me.”

They made love again, to their hearts’ content, more indulgently, more wildly, more sincerely than ever.

She held him and said, “Bite me. Bite me. I want you to leave your teeth marks on my body.”

He held her and said, “Bite me. Bite me. I want you to leave your teeth marks on my body.”

He bit her until there were bruises all over her. He reached out his large hand over her face and gently touched her eyebrows, nose, and lips. He said, “Tiao, Tiao. How can I not see you? You tell me, how can I not see you …?”

They dozed for a while and then woke up at almost the same time.

He pulled her into his arms and she buried her face in his chest. He said, “I think you’re too selfish, Tiao.”

“Yes, I am.”

“You don’t care about others’ suffering at all.”

“Yes, you’re right.”

“You’re also very cold and cruel. I can’t move you even with my lifelong love.”

She said, “Yes, that’s right.”

“Don’t you want to contradict me? I was saying the opposite of what I meant.”

“No, I don’t.”

“I really want to choke you to death.”

“Choke me to death. Choke me now.”

She grabbed his hand and placed it on her neck, squeezing his hand with hers. He freed himself from her grip and kissed the back of her neck. They made love one more time.

At daybreak, she said to him, “You should give me back the key to this apartment.”

2

She thought about phoning Mike; she knew he had gone back to the States long ago. He had called her before he left China, hoping to come to Fuan to meet her. She refused to see him then; her heart at the time could only contain Chen Zai. Now she thought of Mike; she didn’t want to consider this pragmatic. No, she was not that kind of pragmatist. She didn’t know why she wanted to make the call, she only knew that she really wanted to.

She dialed Mike’s home number in Texas, and an utterly unexpected voice struck her dumb — it was Fan who picked up the phone.

Fan said, “Older sister, I never expected it to be you calling.”

“I didn’t expect it to be you answering the phone.”

“I knew I was going to surprise you. I planned to call home in a few days and tell all of you everything.”

“Then you can tell me now.”

“When you came to Chicago and called Mike, I wrote down his home number. And later we became friends.”

“Can you tell me what kind of friends you are?”

“The kind who want to live together. David and I are divorced. He went back to that older German woman of his. I’ll probably marry Mike soon; he’s already proposed.”

“Do you really love him?”

“I really do.”

“Then what about David?”

“I didn’t know anything when I married David.”

“Fan, it’s not that I want to stop you from marrying Mike. I just feel you get some kind of satisfaction from competing with me, and taking things from me. This mind-set can confuse the soul and prevent you from knowing who you really love.”

Fan said, “That’s what I should be saying to you. I just called Chen Zai and heard that you two are not going to get married. You’re the one who wants to compete and take things away, right? You remember Mike when you have no one to turn to.”

Tiao said, “If my agreeing would make you happy, I’d admit you were right. I apologize for remembering Mike when I had no one to turn to. It’s weak and low of me. I should change my attitude and wish you happiness, wish that you and Mike are happy together.”

Fan said, “Do you think I appreciate your sarcasm and insincerity? Don’t use the Chinese way with me. I would rather you shouted.”

Tiao’s hand holding the telephone was shaking. How she wanted to scream at Fan through the receiver. Even though she had no relationship with Mike, she still felt the stab of a deep wound, and Fan was the blade. How busy Fan was, so busy that she didn’t forget to pry into her and Chen Zai’s business even when she was busy dating Mike. She was so busy, busily getting involved in order to spoil things, to get involved by spoiling things, to spoil things by getting involved. She couldn’t be sure of her own existence if she didn’t get involved and spoil things. Tiao held the phone, thinking. The strange thing was that she was no longer so angry. She felt like someone who had seen the final ending of everything, and understood that all the emotion of those who’d tried to change the ending meant nothing, suddenly didn’t matter. She said into the receiver, “Fan, let’s make up. I sincerely wish you two happiness.”