Can Xue - The Embroidered Shoes

That night, we whispered like two mosquitoes in the darkness under the cotton rose tree. The next morning, when I looked in the mirror, I could see scratches from the branches on my face.

“Mother, I want to get married.”

“The cannas under the cotton rose were all trampled,” she said in a flat tone, while digging in her ear with a hairpin. “Such zeal is frightening. At that time your father was not more than a chicken thief. That is to say, the matter is obvious.”

I shouldn’t have let that person stay at our house. For that reason, the old garbage collector hanged himself unaccountably. He hanged himself on our doorframe like a dried up locust. I had fallen into my own trap. After this happened, Father started to laugh every day, covering his mouth. There was a festival atmosphere in the family. Purposefully, Father and Brother would talk some nonsense in loud voices, such as “Hey, say, has that gourd you planted borne diamonds?” “Look, while I was asleep, three cats bit my ear during the night!” And so on. These conversations would end up in their nipping at each other merrily like dogs.

When he came, he crept in like a mantis, clutching a roll of rotten cotton wadding. Stroking his sparse beard, father sniffed cautiously at the cotton while clamping onto his arm.

“Hey, you, young chap, what’s your attitude toward family and marriage?” Father pestered him, his leg sweeping out in a secret attempt to trip him flat unexpectedly.

At that particular moment, I wished he were a moth or something so he could crawl to the ceiling and scare the shit out of them, just as he usually scared me. But this weakling had already lost his ability at transformation. Instead, he could only keep quiet and crawl on the ground with his back bent low.

“Pah!” Mother spat at him. She kicked his cotton wadding so hard that it rolled into the corridor. He followed it rapidly and opened it up. Then he lay there on his stomach.

At first, he was completely quiet. But as soon as people dropped their guard, he started to sneak into the house, making a peculiar sound. It was such a faint yet sharp pulsation that people felt there was something sinister going on. Once a classmate of mine came for a visit. After she sat for a while, her face began to show surprise. She stood up and peeped out. Immediately, I knew what was happening. I coughed loudly, inquired how she managed to cure the tinea on her scalp, and asked her for a prescription. She tried to calm down. Stretching her neck, she struggled to neglect the annoyance. Then she appeared more restless, or even angry. She walked around the room, looking here and there, complaining that I was treating her rudely. Finally, she stamped her feet and called me a shameless liar. Waving her fist threateningly, she left the house. As soon as she was out, I went wild. I kicked down the cupboard and knocked over the tables and chairs, charging toward every possible hiding place. I dug for a long time, my cheeks red with fury, my bent nails carved deep into my flesh. Yet I could find nothing. The noise was everywhere, yet it was invisible. Touching my forehead, I found a smooth bald spot.

My classmate lived on the third floor. She, too, was a mysterious figure. Since she was thirteen, she had been eating a kind of tiny insect called sea ox. At the beginning, it was said that it was for curing the ailment in her eyes, then for curing hemorrhoids. In short, she had illnesses all over her body. Consequently, her pockets were full of the insects. They frequently crawled out and dropped to the ground. “Some people tried to take the treatment, yet they failed to stick it out. How can any treatment be effective without consistency? I have been persistent for six years,” she told me upon her high-school graduation. At present I go to visit her about once a month. She is a small skinny person, always lying sick in a huge wardrobe. (Inside she has put a chair for sleeping that is made of cane.) The glass door of the wardrobe is always tightly closed. I can’t figure out how she can breathe in there. When I come to visit, she asks me to sit in the middle of the room, while she herself remains in the wardrobe. We talk through the glass door. Even with her light weight, she has cracked the cane chair and broken the two back legs.

“Poignant memories!” She always ends her comments with this. Then she stares at her pale, transparent fingers, raising them and turning them around in the light. So far as I remember, she can only talk about one subject, that is, how lonely and damp it is to live in a wardrobe and how bad the air is. According to her, she is disheartened and has given herself up as hopeless because of the bad living conditions inside the wardrobe. If only there were any hope, she would strive forward and do something extraordinary. But there is no hope, not even a hint of hope.

Our break-up happened two months ago, when she discovered my relationship with the detective. I was combing my hair when she arrived. She gave me an angry stare and said between her teeth, “What a damp day it is today.” She threw something wrapped in a newspaper at me. Before I could recognize what it was, dozens of lumps appeared on my neck.

“Don’t fancy that you can follow your inclination unchecked,” she declared in a shaking, angry voice. “Your dirty relationship has hurt others. Who has caused my present situation? Every night I bang the door of my wardrobe as loud as a cannon. I even swallow handfuls of salt. When you were squatting under the cotton rose tree, I shot at you with my air gun, you dirty pigs. Every day I risk breaking my heart. Oh, holy God, those withered cannas, those insatiably avaricious deeds. I’ve seen clearly from my window. Oh, Lord, please answer me if there is justice in this world! How can such despicable, shameless invasions of another’s personality be allowed? My room is so clean. I hang two scented bags at my window. I change them every day. Once in a while, I leave two peacock feathers in place of the bags. The effect is marvelous. But now everything is gone. Everything is destroyed completely. By whom? Two villains without any ambition, mean sordid merchants! You will be punished!” She was heartbroken and left beating her chest and stamping her feet.

For more than a dozen days, I was unable to sleep. Instead, I hopped up and down on one leg till dawn, fighting with my life against an invisible little something. Eventually, my sprained feet swelled as big as buckets, and my body was completely mashed. I had to negotiate with the detective, intending to break our relationship.

“Help, help!” Before I could open my mouth, he dashed over to open the door. His yell attracted all our neighbors.

I closed the door and pushed it tight with my buttocks, asking why he was doing that.

“Fleas!” He stamped with fury.

“Fleas?”

“Fleas, fleas! You broken clock collector (I can’t imagine why he called me such a nickname). Now I see that you’ve been hiding it all this time, pretending to be self-satisfied. Yesterday you were bitten while having a meal. You were so itchy, yet you only smiled lightly, saying it was nothing but a rash. I’ve been fooled by your family. How could I be so stupid? I get furious when I think about it. Oh, no, wait a minute. I’m not angry at all. I didn’t mean anything when I said I was furious. Now I’ve become completely detached. I’m going to live a pure life, resembling the birds flying in the blue sky.” Jumping up suddenly, he hung from the ceiling, swinging his legs back and forth. With a smile, he told me he was practicing some kind of breathing exercises, and he suggested that I try it, too.

“This is something meaningful. Ever since I discovered the exercise, I realize that my body glows and is as light as a swallow. The roles I played in the past are no comparison, just children’s games. Your classmate is such an outstanding model. Once I saw her sitting motionlessly in the glass wardrobe. I was so touched that tears ran down my cheeks.” When he swung in front of me, he kicked heavily at my shoulder. “It could be that you have some kind of jealousy about my success? Can I change my natural disposition through a period of hard practice?”