Jia Pingwa - Ruined City

She had barely finished speaking when Zhuang walked in the door.

“We were just talking about you,” the cousin’s husband said.

“We haven’t seen you in ages,” Zhuang said genially. “I hear you won a contract for the kiln, so you must be doing well.”

“You make money without working for it, or you work hard without making any money. I could fire bricks all night long, but what I make doesn’t amount to one of your punctuation marks. I busy myself all day long without much to show for it. I received a message about some planned affair, so I told her I would pass up a chance to mine gold to come over. I brought some local produce.”

“I’m not in business and I’m not building a house, so what planned affair are you talking about?” Zhuang was puzzled. “It must be that she missed you and wanted you to visit.”

“You’re less open and honest than Yueqing. You won’t invite country cousins to come for a meal, is that it? Well, I’d be here even if you didn’t want me to be, and I’ll bring the whole family, plus Aunty’s relatives and friends.”

The man looked too serious to be joking, so Zhuang turned to his wife. “What’s this all about?”

Niu Yueqing just smiled.

“You’re always running around, never worrying about what goes on at home,” Liu Yue said. “Now you’ve even forgotten your own birthday.”

Zhuang’s face darkened as he gave the red clothes a shake. “Am I about to turn seventy or eighty? We never celebrate Mother’s birthday, so why celebrate mine?” He turned to the cousin’s husband. “Don’t listen to Yueqing. She’s just looking for something to do. Go ahead and eat. I’ve already eaten.”

He went into his study.

The cousin’s husband had planned to speak with Zhuang at the dinner table, but when he saw the unhappy look on his face, he changed his mind and said to Yueqing in a low voice that when her cousin received the potion to produce a son, she was told to try it for a month. But she’d caught a cold that had lasted three days, and then he’d had to leave home to collect a debt owed by a kiln customer. He was away for two weeks, and they’d missed the window of opportunity when he got back home. He wanted to know if they could get more of the potion from the old lady. That upset Niu Yueqing: That potion cost several hundred yuan. How much could the outstanding debt have been? It’s true, you didn’t have to agree to help, but when you did, you needed to keep your promise, since other people are affected by your failure to do so. How could you be so careless? But things being the way they were, she could not say anything unpleasant; besides, they were relatives, and she needed their help.

“I’ll ask,” she said. “This potion has to be treasured. The eagle wood alone cost me five hundred yuan.”

“I promise I won’t go anywhere next month, no matter what,” he said. “I won’t touch any alcohol, either.”

“You must keep it a secret,” Niu Yueqing whispered. “Don’t tell anyone. Let me know when she’s pregnant, and I’ll take her some nutritious food. Don’t say anything negative, don’t let her do any heavy work, and don’t argue or upset her. When the time comes, I’ll talk to someone I know at the city hospital, and they’ll send a car to pick her up.”

He nodded. “Of course. We’ll do as you say.”

“And don’t tell Zhidie that she had to take more of the potion,” Yueqing said before going into the study. “Come have a drink with him, even if you don’t want to eat. I’m going out to buy her a pair of sandals. I’ll be right back.”

Zhuang walked into the living room with a bottle of liquor, wearing a smile.

Rushing out of the house, Niu Yueqing first went to Granny Wang’s, where she bought another potion for five hundred yuan, then headed to a shoe store to buy sandals. When she got home, her cousin’s husband and Zhuang had drunk half a bottle. Putting the shoes and potion in a plastic bag, she said to her cousin’s husband, “Here are the shoes. Be careful on your way home.” She signaled to him with her eyes. Knowing what she meant, he said, “I will,” before saying good-bye. Realizing that he hadn’t been very cordial, Zhuang felt bad about what he had said earlier, so he walked the cousin’s husband out to the end of the lane. After the visitor was out of sight, his displeasure with Niu Yueqing’s plan for his birthday flared up again, so he went to the park outside the west gate to listen to some street performers sing a Qin opera. On his way home, he spotted a taxi coming out of their lane; the passenger looked like Gong Jingyuan’s son, so he asked his wife when he walked in the door, “Was Gong Jingyuan’s son just here?”

“Yes. Everyone says the young man is an opium addict, and his face did look like a tattered sack. He said his father had urgent business that required him to make a trip to Lanzhou early tomorrow morning and told him to send a gift over. I offered him tea, but he wouldn’t drink it. His nose was running, so he was off somewhere to smoke opium. Ai! I wonder what he was in a previous life, and why he’s here now to bring ruin to the family.”

Zhuang took a look around and saw a large birthday cake and a fancy paper tote bag with “Luxurious satin comforter cover” printed on the side.

“So you told Gong Jingyuan, too?”

“I ran into him on the street this afternoon and mentioned it in passing. You can’t say no when he has his son bring over a gift, can you?”

“I told you I don’t want a birthday celebration, so why are you accepting gifts?” Zhuang fumed. “You do like to show off, telling people without checking with me. Did I just become an emperor or a new father? Haven’t I lost enough face over the Jing Xueyin fiasco? Now you want to have a celebration in the midst of this foul atmosphere, which will give people a reason to laugh at me? Return the gifts to the people you’ve told. If you don’t, I’ll stay away that day.”

Niu Yueqing was speechless.

The old lady came out of her room.

“I don’t like to meddle in your affairs, but what you just said was deplorable. I was already unhappy, with everyone waiting for you to come home for dinner, and then, when you finally show up, you say all those things to your cousin’s husband. Are you intentionally insulting my relatives? I should be the one who objects to Yueqing’s plan for your birthday celebration. Your father came this morning and mocked me for having an unfilial daughter. I told him I’m old and must depend on her, and that in the end we have to look to our son-in-law for help. A son-in-law is like half a son, so you are a son in two families. I don’t like to complain about you two, but now you’re unhappy over a relative creating a foul atmosphere? Is that a complaint about my poor relatives? This house once produced a famous person, and the Water Board would have been as powerful as the yamen if Xijing hadn’t brought in tap water.”

Zhuang helped the old lady back to her room and told Liu Yue to make her a glass of orange juice. “What are you talking about, Mother? I was just unhappy that Yueqing made plans without consulting me, and that she has no understanding of how irritated I am these days.”

“You’re irritated?” Niu Yueqing said from the living room. “I’m your wife, don’t you think I have a reason to be irritated? We’ve had so much bad luck this year, I thought a birthday celebration could chase the bad away. But what do I get? Nothing but a warm cheek bumping up against a cold behind. You say awful things that cut into my heart like a knife. I’ve put up with it so long I’ve gotten used to it. But now you’ve embarrassed me in front of my cousin’s husband, making me lose face and all standing in the family. You’re always talking and laughing outside the house, but once you’re home, you do nothing but scowl. Over the past six months, you’ve become a different person. You’re tired of me, aren’t you? Everyone says I have a good life at home, but no one knows that I’m not a wife, I’m your maid, your slave.”