Li Ang: The Lost Garden

“Is it really all right to dance here?” Unease caused her to blurt this out, but the moment she said it she realized that with the thunderous music, Lin couldn’t have heard her even though they were practically pressed against each other. She could only turn her face toward him and shout into his ear, which made it natural for them to dance in each other’s arms without worrying about how they looked to the others.

“Don’t worry,” he said, lowering his head and raising his voice slightly to speak into her ear, but most of what he said was lost amid loud music mixed with someone singing. She repeated her question, but only heard the second half of his answer:

“… is there a better place to hold a girl in one’s arms?”

Nodding, she relaxed her arm on his shoulder and held him lightly.

One by one, the other dinner guests got up to join them. Some of the drunken men were holding the girls, but it looked like they were hanging onto them as their hands roamed over their bodies. Others continued to dance, seemingly still sober, and pressed their bodies tightly up against those special areas of the women’s bodies. Zhu frowned and gave Lin a smile, before looking away. She heard someone singing:

I never thought the feeling of separation could be so sad

It was not till today that I knew it takes so much strength to even say good-bye

Like most popular love songs, this one spoke of an honest sorrow, using simple words for longing to express heartbreak. The only difference was that the singer had a low voice, which meant she had to struggle to ring out the higher tones, creating the effect of undying love, as if every word were like crying through blood and tears. With a few turns on the dance floor, Yinghong was able to see the singer — one of the girls hired for that night’s dinner, who was standing by the musicians, holding a microphone. Yinghong could not recall whether her name was Meilan or Fangfang, mainly because she held the microphone close to her mouth in big, bony hands that covered half her face.

Those were the hands of a woman traditionally considered born to a sad life in the entertainment industry. Eyes closed and head tilted slightly back, she presented a picture of self-degradation so typical of women in the red light district. As she sang, her head and shoulders swayed, her tightly knit brows painting her young face with the sorrow and bleakness of someone who had already suffered her fair share of a tough life.

If I’d known it would be like this, I wouldn’t have agreed to let you go

I told you I wouldn’t cry

I told you I give you my fond good wishes

Never once had a low-class popular song, especially one about nothing but love and hate bellowed out of a working girl’s mouth on a night of heavy drinking and carnal pleasure, exerted such irresistible power. Yinghong first felt the effects of the alcohol surging vaguely inside; the slow-dance steps required little movement, but she began to feel dizzy.

Then there was the music, deafening music that made her feel as though she were sinking. The drum set was beating faster than her heart, each note thumping violently against her chest, while the fast-tempo keyboard was made to sound like flying arrows. On top of that was the girl’s song about deep, boundless sorrow and bitterness that accompanied profound love, which was slowly seeping through the loud music and worming its way into her heart.

I want to hold back my tears but I can’t keep my sorrow in check

I don’t know when my face became covered in tears

Finally I understood the feeling of abandonment.

I rested my head on Lin Xigeng’s shoulder, utterly disgusted by the unbearable banquet. For the first time in my life, I was at the same table as a group of working girls who drank and flirted with Taipei’s nouveau riche, falling short only of having sex then and there. Worse yet, I was actually touched by the love and resentment in a sappy popular song sung by a woman of the trade.

In fact, it became clear to me that I was engaged in self-indulging abandonment; or to put it differently, in a degenerating indulgence. I experienced fierce, drunken pleasure, the enjoyment of letting myself go.

Which was how I finally comprehended feelings of abandonment.

For different reasons, our desire for love meant that we, as women — the working girl, the song, and I — were doomed to be underappreciated, for no one could truly understand or know how to cherish us; true reciprocal feelings would never be ours to enjoy.

Since we knew our fate, we — the working girl, the girl in the song, and I — would be better off if we abandoned love altogether. Then, after experiencing the helplessness and bitterness of regret, disenchantment with self-abandonment would lead us to endless degenerating and indulgent acts, the deprivation accompanied by wretched resentment and decadent pursuits.

If I’d known it would be like this, I wouldn’t have agreed to let you go

I told you I wouldn’t cry

I told you I give you my fond good wishes

Zhu Yinghong felt that her body was drifting and disintegrating, inch by inch, as the thunderous drum continued to pound against the deepest recess of her heart. The song continued, with its sorrow and bitterness from the self-abnegation of love, roared and roared as it movingly depicted a drunken, frenzied, orgiastic sensation.

I was dazed, but I couldn’t stop thinking that, if at that moment this tall, handsome man had understood, I’d have gone with him anywhere to do anything.

Never once had I experienced such a fierce desire for a man I’d known only for a few hours. I’d fallen for good-looking men before, but it was never quite like this. I couldn’t control the intoxicating desire for carnal pleasure; I’d never felt such longing to be held, touched, and pressed down hard by a man.

I told myself that all I wanted was a feeling of being fulfilled and belonging to someone, the kind of contact I could not complete alone, a comforting sensation that could come only from a man’s embrace and caresses.

But I immediately knew that no one could understand me, and that I was doomed to be hurt.

Leaning against Lin Xigeng, Zhu Yinghong maintained a level of self-control even under the influence of alcohol and the titillating ambience, but she was nevertheless shocked by her own reckless reactions. The tall man offered such comfortable arms, and the charming song expressed such intoxicating emotions, that she decided to let herself go and not worry about anything.

The song came to an end in her dazed state, but she kept her hand on his shoulder; it was only when he began to talk that she realized that the deafening music was over, replaced by a sudden emptiness and silence. Now she heard his every word.

“You look like you were born in the last century,” he said. “You have a serene quality particular to women of that age.”

Still recovering, she looked up at him but didn’t respond.

“With the virtues of traditional Taiwanese women, who were chaste, submissive, well brought up, and well behaved.”

She smiled faintly.

“You really look like you were born in the last century, the turn of the last century, to Taiwan’s last gentry family,” he continued.

“Like in the 1890s.”

She said, more like a reflex, but she was surprised by how loud she was, with her body still very much draped over his, the way they had been dancing.

“Something like that.”

He said with a nod, to which she responded with another smile. But perhaps because she had yet to recover from a drunken, sentimental state, her face quivered and that smile began to spread, uncontrollably, until she cracked open her mouth and began to laugh, accompanied by tears. Then she heard herself blurt out without thinking: