“Madam General Manager, my first question to you is, how did you come up with the unusual name ‘Unicorn’ for your shop, your factory, and your line of clothing?” Her smile exuded confidence. One look at her told you she was educated, intelligent, rich, and powerful – a woman to be reckoned with. “It’s rather a long story,” she replied. “More than three decades ago, my father adopted the pseudonym Unicorn. According to him, the unicorn is a magical beast that resembles, to some degree at least, a rhinoceros. It is the ‘magic horn of the heart’ that signifies a coming together in ancient texts. Lovers, spouses, friends, aren’t they all a magic horn of the heart? That is why I chose it for the name of our shop. Turning it into a product name was the next logical step. Magic horn of the heart, yes, magic horn of the heart, doesn’t the sound just carry you off into a world of blissful emotions? But I’m afraid I’ve gotten carried away myself, and all our magic horn of the heart friends out there don’t need me to offer an explanation.”
Why don’t you just shut up! Jintong sputtered indignantly. How dare you take the credit for that! I’ll “Unicorn” you one day!
Seated across from the hostess, a woman with protruding front teeth, Wang Yinzhi talked on and on. “Of course, my husband played a significant role in the early days of the business, but then he fell ill and is now convalescing, leaving it up to me to fight on alone. The unicorn is a true fighter in the wild, and I consider it my duty to carry on the unicorn’s fighting spirit.” “What, may I ask,” the bucktoothed hostess asked, “is your goal?” “To turn Unicorn into a nationally known product line within three years, an international one within ten, and, ultimately, the world leader in apparel.”
Jintong flung the remote control at the televised image of Wang Yinzhi. Have you no shame at all? The remote control bounced off of the TV set and landed on the floor. Meanwhile, on the screen, Wang Yinzhi, her falsies protruding like little umbrellas beneath her thin blouse, captivating a vast audience of youngsters, talked on and on. “Madam General Manager, in recent years, young women in the West have gotten caught up in a breast liberation movement. They say that brassieres are no different than the harmful corsets women wore in the seventeenth century. What’s your opinion?” “It’s ignorance, pure and simple!” Wang Yinzhi said categorically. “Those corsets were made of canvas and bamboo splints, like a suit of armor, so of course they were harmful. I’d say you can equate the European women’s love affair with the corset with the way Chinese women bound their feet. But you can’t compare either the corset or bound feet with a modern bra, especially our Unicorn product. A brassiere meets the needs of beauty and health. At Unicorn we take both aspects into account, doing everything possible to satisfy both aesthetic and biological requirements.”
Jintong picked up a teacup to fling at the TV set, but at the last moment he aimed it at the paper-cushioned wall; it hardly made a sound as it bounced harmlessly onto the carpeted floor, sending a few mildewed tea leaves and some red tea splashing onto the wall and the TV set.
A single limp tea leaf stuck to the 29-inch TV screen, like a beard just beneath her mouth. “May I ask, Madam General Manager, are you wearing a Unicorn bra?” the bucktoothed hostess asked, trying to be witty. “Of course I am,” she said as she reached up and shifted her false breasts – seemingly subconsciously, but actually quite intentionally. A bit of free advertising there. “How about your home life, Madam General Manager. Would you say it’s happy?” “Not really,” she replied candidly. “My husband suffers from a psychosis. But he’s a good and decent man.”
That’s crap! He jumped up off the sofa. This is all a plot against me. Honeyed words to my face, then you stab me in the back. You’ve got me under house arrest. The camera caught Wang Yinzhi at an angle that showed her sinister smile, as if she knew that Jintong was home watching her on TV.
He got up, turned off the TV, and began pacing the floor anxiously like a caged simian, hands clasped behind his back, anger mounting by the second. Psychosis? You’re the one with the goddamned psychosis! You say I can’t manage the business? I’m saying I can! You daughter of a whore, you just won’t let me. You’re not a real woman. You’re a stone woman, a hermaphroditic toad spirit! Overcome by a welter of emotions, an exhausted Shangguan Jintong lay down on his faux antique carpet on that spring evening in 1993 and began to sob uncontrollably.
By the time his tears had soaked a spot the size of a bowl, his Fil-ipina servant entered. “Dinner’s ready, sir,” she said as she placed a basket of food on the table, then took out a bowl of glutinous rice, a platter of stewed lamb and turnips, another of tiny shrimp and celery, and a bowl of sweet-and-sour soup with snakehead fish. She handed him a pair of imitation ivory chopsticks and urged him to eat.
Jintong had no appetite for the steaming food arrayed in front of him. Turning to the servant, his eyes puffy from crying, he shouted in anger, “What am I? Tell me that!”
The poor girl was so frightened she just stood there with her arms hanging loosely at her side. “I don’t know, sir…”
“You damned spy!” He flung his chopsticks down on the table. “You’re working undercover for Wang Yinzhi, you damned spy!”
“I don’t understand, sir, I don’t know what you mean…”
“You put slow-acting poison in this food. You want to see me dead!” He picked up the dishes and dumped their contents on the table. Then he flung the bowl of soup at the servant. “Get out of my sight, you spying bitch!”
She ran out of the room howling, her clothes wet and sticky.
Wang Yinzhi, you counterrevolutionary, you enemy of the people, you bloodsucking insect, you damned rightist, capitalist-roader, reactionary capitalist, degenerate, class outsider, parasite, petty scoundrel tied to the post of historical disgrace, bandit, turncoat, hooligan, rogue, concealed class enemy of the people, royalist, filial daughter and virtuous granddaughter of old man Confucius, feudalism apologist, advocate for the restoration of the slave system, spokeswoman for the declining landlord class… Calling up every degrading political term he’d learned over several turbulent decades, he launched a verbal attack against Wang Yinzhi. Tonight you and I are going to have it out once and for all. Either the fish dies or the net breaks. Only one will be left standing. When two armies clash, victory goes to the most heroic!
Wang Yinzhi opened the door, a ring of golden keys in her hand, and stood in the doorway. “Here I am,” she said with a scornful smile. “Let’s see what you’re made of.”
Mustering up his courage, Jintong said, “I’m going to kill you!”
“Well,” she said with a laugh, “a spark of life, finally. If you really have the guts to kill anyone, you’ve earned my respect.”
She walked unafraid into the room, gave the filth on the floor a wide berth, and stopped in front of Jintong. She smacked him on the head with her key ring. “You ungrateful bastard!” she cursed. “I’d like to know what you’re so unhappy about. You live in the finest hotel in town, you’ve got a servant to prepare your meals. Stick out your arms and you’ll be clothed, open your mouth and you’ll be fed. You live like an emperor, so what the hell else do you want?”
“I want… my freedom,” Jintong muttered.
She froze for just a moment, before bursting out laughing. “I don’t restrict your freedom,” she said after she’d had a good laugh. “In fact, you can leave right this minute. Go!”
“Who are you to tell me to go? It’s my shop, and if anyone’s going to get out of here, it’s you, not me.”