Tian said, “Please bring her along, Aunt.”
“All right, I’ll be back in a minute.” Shulan went over to the elevator. From the rear she looked smaller than when she stood behind the food stand.
Tian and Meifen sat down on the lone bench in the lobby. She explained that Shulan’s husband had come to the States seven years before, but had disappeared a year later. Nobody was sure of his whereabouts, though rumor had it that he was in Houston, manning a gift shop and living with a young woman. By now Shulan was no longer troubled by his absence from home. She felt he had merely used her as his cook and bed warmer, so she could manage without him.
“Mom, you were right to invite her,” Tian said sincerely.
Meifen smiled without comment.
A few minutes later Shulan came down with her daughter, a reedy, anemic fifteen-year-old wearing circular glasses and a checkered mackinaw that was too big on her. The girl looked unhappy and climbed into the car silently. As Tian drove away, he reminded the guests in the back to buckle up. Meanwhile, the snow abated some, but the flakes were still swirling around the streetlights and fluttering outside glowing windows. An ambulance howled, its strobe slashing the darkness. Tian pulled aside to let the white van pass, then resumed driving.
Tian and Connie’s home impressed Shulan as Meifen gave her a tour through the two floors and the finished basement. The woman kept saying in a singsong voice, “This is a real piece of property, so close to downtown.” Her daughter, Ching, didn’t follow the grown-ups but stayed in the living room fingering the piano, a Steinway, which Tian had bought for Connie at a clearance sale. The girl had learned how to play the instrument before coming to the United States, though she could tickle out only a few simple tunes, such as “Jingle Bells,” “Yankee Doodle Dandy,” and “The Newspaper Boy Song.” Even those sounded hesitant and disjointed. She stopped when her mother came back and told her not to embarrass both of them with her “clumsy fingers” anymore. The girl then sat before the TV, watching a well-known historian speaking about the recent Orange Revolution in Ukraine and its impact on the last few communist countries. Soon the four grown-ups began wrapping dumplings. Tian used a beer bottle to press the dough, having no rolling pin in the house. He was skilled but couldn’t make wrappers fast enough for the three women, so Connie found a lean hot-sauce bottle and helped him with the dough from time to time. Meifen was unhappy about the lack of a real rolling pin and grumbled, “What kind of life you two have been living! You have no plan for a decent home.”
Connie wouldn’t talk back, just picked up a wrapper and filled it with a dollop of the stuffing, which was seasoned with sesame oil and five-spice powder. Shulan said, “If I lived so close to downtown, I wouldn’t cook at all and would have no need for a rolling pin either.” She kept smiling, her front teeth propping up her top lip a bit.
“Your place’s pot stickers are delicious,” Tian said to her to change the subject.
“I prepare the filling every day. Meifen, next time you stop by, you should try it. It tastes real good.”
“Sure thing,” Meifen said. “Did you already know how to make those snacks back home?”
“No way. I learned how to do that here. My boss used to be a hotel chef in Hangzhou.”
“You must’ve gone through lots of hardships.”
“I wouldn’t complain. Life here is no picnic and most people work very hard.”
Tian smiled quizzically, then said, “My dad retired at fifty-eight with a full pension. Every morning he carries a pair of goldfinches in a cage to the bank of the Songhua. Old people are having an easy time back home.”
“Not every one of them,” his mother corrected him. “Your father enjoys some leisure only because he joined the revolution early in his youth. He’s entitled to his pension and free medical care.”
“Matter of fact,” Shulan said, “most folks are as poor as before in my old neighborhood. I have to send my parents money every two months.”
“They don’t have a pension?” Meifen asked.
“They do, but my mother suffers from gout and high blood pressure. My father lost most of his teeth and needed new dentures. Nowadays folks can’t afford to be sick anymore.”
“That’s true,” Tian agreed. “Most people are the have-nots.”
The stout kettle whistled in the kitchen and it was time to boil the dumplings. Connie left to set the pot on, her waist-length hair swaying a little as she walked away. “You have a nice and pretty daughter-in-law,” Shulan said to Meifen. “You’re a lucky woman, elder sister.”
“You don’t know what a devil of a temper she has.”
“Mom, don’t start again,” Tian begged.
“See, Shulan,” Meifen whispered, “my son always sides with his bride. The little fox spirit really knows how to charm her man.”
“This is unfair, Mom,” her son objected.
Both women laughed and turned away to wash their hands.
Ten minutes later Tian went into the living room and called Ching to come over to the table, on which, besides the steaming dumplings, were plates of smoked mackerel, roast duck, cucumber and tomato salad, and spiced bamboo shoots. When they were all seated, with Meifen at the head of the rectangular table, Tian poured plum wine for Shulan and his mother. He and Connie and Ching would drink beer.
The two older women continued reminiscing about the people they both knew. To Tian’s amazement, the girl swigged her glass of beer as if it were a soft drink. Then he remembered she had spent her childhood in Harbin, where even children were beer drinkers. He spoke English with her and asked her what classes she’d been taking at school. The girl seemed too introverted to volunteer any information and just answered each question with two or three words. She confessed that she hated the Sunday class, in which she had to copy the Chinese characters and memorize them.
Shulan mentioned a man nicknamed Turtle Baron, the owner of a fishery outside Harbin. “Oh, I knew of him,” Meifen said. “He used to drive a fancy car to the shopping district every day, but he lost his fortune.”
“What happened?” Shulan asked.
“He fed drugs to crayfish so they grew big and fierce, but some Hong Kong tourists got food-poisoned and took him to court.”
“He was a wild man, but a filial son, blowing big money on his mother’s birthdays. Where’s he now?”
“In jail,” Meifen said.
“Obviously that was where he was headed. The other day I met a fellow who had just come out of the mainland. He said he wouldn’t eat street food back home anymore, because he couldn’t tell what he was actually eating. Some people even make fake eggs and fake salt. It’s mind-boggling. How can anyone turn a profit by doing that, considering the labor?”
They all cracked up except for the girl. Sprinkling a spoonful of vinegar on the three dumplings on her plate, Shulan continued, “People ought to believe in Jesus Christ. That’ll make them behave better, less like animals.”
“Do you often go to church?” Meifen asked, chewing the tip of a duck wing.
“Yes, every Sunday. It makes me feel calm and hopeful. I used to hate my husband’s bone marrow, but now I don’t hate him anymore. God will deal with him on my behalf.”
Ching listened to her mother without showing any emotion, as if Shulan were speaking about a stranger. Meifen said, “Maybe I should visit your church one of these days.”
“Please do. Let me know when you want to come. I’ll introduce you to Brother Zhou, our pastor. He’s a true gentleman. I’ve never met a man so kind. He used to be a doctor in Chengdu and still gives medical advice. He cured my stomach ulcer.”
Connie, eating focaccia bread instead of the dumplings that contained soy sauce, said under her breath, “Ching, do you have a boyfriend?”