Eventually, that faint echo was drowned out by the roar of a huge truck going by outside.
Opening my eyes, I stood up and went over to the window. I closed one side, thought for a while, and then closed the other. But locked up within my feelings, I still couldn't sort out my connection to the unexpected stranger on the stairs.
Finally, I let it go.
After taking a shower, I got into bed and turned out the light.
By this time it had started to rain, and the huge drops clattering on the street below sounded like the hooves of countless horses or beasts galloping by.
…The noise outside seemed to have pulled me into a huge party. A woman spinning in one corner of the dance floor glided over and looked at me with burning desire, her warm hand persistently seeking mine. Only when she at last took my hand in hers did I realize that it was Ho.
She asked me to dance.
I said that the two of us couldn't dance together.
She said, Why can't we? Listen. It's the latest music, males and females dance the same steps. The magnetic music pulled us onto the dance floor, and, holding my hand, she guided me out among the dancers. Our feet moved forward, back, in the crowded space, but we didn't bump into anyone, and so we danced our androgynous dance.
Under the bewildering changes of the constantly flashing colored lights, the faces around me kept changing shape. Ho and I held each other closely, afraid that the other might turn into someone else in a moment of inattention. Like the sound of the little drum in an opera orchestra, her heart beat wildly against my breast. Her body emitted an intangible heat as she pressed herself tightly against me. She held my young buttocks firmly in her hands, so exciting me that I began to gasp for breath.
With her bright eyes she coaxed me as we danced lightly down a sinuous, narrow, sloping corridor to a railing. Beyond it, I saw, was a deserted garden. We stopped. Then, in the dim light, I followed her into the garden without question, thinking of nothing but her.
When she started undoing my blouse, the sound of my wildly beating heart so unsettled her that her fingers began to fumble with the buttons. I said nothing, letting her do with me as she wished. When she had undone my blouse, she didn't take it off; she simply spread it open and ran her fingers through my hair, pushing it back from my forehead to reveal my entire face. Then she stepped back several paces so that we were not too close together, yet not too far apart; that is, we were not so close together that she could not appreciate my features, nor so far apart that the dim light obscured them.
Then she began undoing her own blouse and stood facing me in the same attitude in which I faced her, so that we could enjoy each other. A vague anxiety was unsettling me. I longed feverishly for her to reveal her beauty to me totally. Her every movement and gesture overcame me with its perfect beauty, and filled me with desire.
She was my mirror.
We gazed intently at each other for a long time, her eyes looking vaguely dejected and at the same time inquisitive. I had never before seen such a suggestive look in such an intelligent and passionate female face. Her short, neat, glossy hair and the serious lines at the corners of her mouth perfectly embodied her calm profundity and her rich life experience.
It is quite safe to say that at that moment I saw her far more clearly than she saw me.
A giddy feeling of joy began to rise up from the soles of my feet.
When she came over to me and kissed my cheek, it was just as it had been many years earlier – her glowing skin lightly touching mine; the familiar, delicate fragrance of her sinuous figure; from the center of my being, her voice softly calling my name. Just as it had been in those earlier times, my pulse quickened and I began to tremble, until at last I listened to her with my heart, held her within my heart of hearts. At the same time I felt ashamed of my liaison with Ti, my "fall," ashamed because I had betrayed her, hurt her.
Suddenly, I felt weak and helpless and struggled desperately to breathe. Inexplicably, out of nowhere that familiar "third hand" was reaching out toward my body, and ignoring all else, I eagerly received it. As we turned in dance, I was bathed in a shuddering consummation. Everything around me seemed to be melting, and my skin tingled with tense, numbing excitement.
As our passion subsided, we drooped with exhaustion and stood apart as our breathing returned to normal.
Then all at once my dance partner's formerly slim, graceful legs caught my attention. In an instant they had become as strong and thick as tree trunks. My eyes slowly traveled up those legs, as sturdy as those of a work horse, to discover that my dance partner had changed into someone else, a male. Taken aback, I said, What's happening?
He laughed slyly.
I said, I don't need you.
He said, Your lust needs me.
My face flushed red, and I said, In my heart I do not need you.
He said, You don't know yourself. Your real inner need is, in fact, me.
Feeling like I was the object of some joke, I looked anxiously everywhere for Ho.
I backed farther away from the man and shouted, I don't need you, I don't need you at all…
A deafening explosion jerked me awake. Blotting out the sound of the continuous rain, it jarred all the residents of the building out of their dreams.
The explosion was followed by an eerie silence, then the corridors rang with a piercing female scream, "Someone, please! Help! Help!"
Again, there was a dead silence.
Soon the corridors were filled with the clanging of burglar-proof doors opening and the scattered scuffle of slippered feet. The noise and confusion got louder and louder.
It had taken me this long to fully awaken. Now, I shot out of bed and rushed to the door. Someone was already pounding on it.
I swung it open to see Ho standing there, frightened beyond measure.
She said, "Are you all right?"
Without a word, I grabbed her and we rushed to my mother's apartment.
The hallway was already jammed with people asking each other about the explosion. Without stopping to talk to anyone, I raced to my mother's door and started pounding on it violently.
There was no answer.
I knew that Mother was a light sleeper, and when she didn't respond, the strength went out of my legs.
I began to shout and bang the door with my fists.
Ho said, "Quick. Go and get your key."
When we finally got the door open, we rushed into Mother's bedroom and shook her awake, to find to our surprise that nothing had happened, that she was safe and sound.
A great stone of fear was lifted from my heart.
Mother explained that she hadn't been feeling well for the past few days and because she couldn't sleep, she had taken an extra-strong dose of sleeping pills.
The lights were out in the corridors, and in the inky darkness Ho and I groped our way upstairs with some neighbors who had heard where the accident was.
There was already a crowd of people outside the door of the Ge girl's apartment. Pale as a ghost, she stood stricken outside the open door, trembling uncontrollably, muttering repeatedly, "Please help my papa! The kitchen… the pressure cooker…," while her husband stood jouncing their wailing son in his arms.
Suddenly I put things together: the familiar-looking "stranger" I had bumped into in the stairwell must have been Mr. Ge. After hiding for so many years, he had finally resurfaced, come home.
Nervously, I followed several of our neighbors into the apartment, looking for the kitchen, but what I saw there made me sick with fear.
The "stranger" was indeed Mr. Ge. He was stretched out on the dull red tile floor. A red and white mess the consistency of paste was splattered all around his head. The twisted, empty pressure cooker was beside his left shoulder, the bean porridge it had contained spewed everywhere, the lid nowhere to be seen. There was a round hole in his skull just behind his left ear, from which the grayish curd of his brain and syrupy thick blood still oozed. It was disgusting.