"What are you thinking?" she asks.
"Nothing."
"Then what are you looking at?"
"The elevator going up and down in the building opposite. You can see the people inside the elevator, there's a couple kissing."
"I can't see them," she sits up in the bed.
You're talking about using a long-range lens.
"Close the curtains."
She is lying on her back, her white body completely bare except for the luxuriant clump of downy hair between her legs.
"They wanted to make a video but the hairs were too stark," you tease.
"Who are you talking about? Here? Who's making videos?"
You say it's a machine, that it's automatic.
"Impossible, this isn't China."
You say that the Mainland authorities have bought the hotel.
She sighs softly, sits up, and says: "You've got a phobia." She puts out her arm and runs her fingers through your hair. "Switch on the table lamp, I'll go and switch off the main light."
"No need. Just now we were in too much of a hurry for me to have a good look."
You utter sweet words, bend down to kiss her lustrous white belly in the bright light, and ask, "Do you feel cold?"
"A little," she laughs. "Want some more cognac?"
You say you'd like some coffee. She gets out of the bed, switches off the air-conditioner, plugs in the electric kettle and puts instant coffee into a cup. Her full breasts sway weightily.
"Don't you think I'm fat?" she says with a laugh. "Chinese women have better figures."
You say, not necessarily. You adore her breasts, their solidity, their sensuousness.
"Haven't you ever had…?"
Facing you, she sits in the round chair by the window and leans back, tilting her head and letting you look as much as you want. She is blocking the illuminated building with the elevator, and the mountain behind looks darker. On this wonderful night, you say that her body is incredibly white, as if it's not real.
"And you want coffee so that you will be more awake?" There is scorn in her eyes.
"So that I can hold onto this instant better!"
You say that life, at times, is like a miracle and you are lucky to be alive. All this is pure coincidence and yet it is real and not a dream.
"I'd like always to be dreaming but it's just not possible. I prefer not to think of anything."
She sips the cognac and closes her eyes. She is a white German woman with very dark hair and long eyelashes. You get her to part her legs so you can see clearly and have her deeply imprinted in your memory. She says she doesn't want memories, only to feel this instant. You ask if she can feel you looking at her. She says she can reel you roaming over her body. Where have I roamed? you ask. She says from her toes to her waist, oh-she's gushing again, she says she wants you. You say you want her, too, but you also want to see how this body, so full of life, twists and turns.
"For a better photograph?" she asks, her eyes closed.
Yes." Your eyes are fixed on her and scour her entire body.
"Can you photograph everything?"
"Nothing is left out."
"Aren't you afraid?"
"Of what?"
You say you have no inhibitions. She says she has even less. You say this is Hong Kong, and China is now far away from you. You get up and press against her. She asks you to switch off the main light, and you again enter her moist body.
"Are you deeply attracted to me?" She is slightly breathless.
"Yes, I'm buried." You say you are buried in her flesh.
"Flesh only?"
"Yes, and there are no memories, only this instant."
She says she also needs to be fused like this in darkness, in nebulous chaos.
"Just to feel the warmth of a woman…"
"Men also have warmth. It's been a long time since…"
"You've had a man?"
"Since I've had this sort of sensation, this trembling…"
"Why?"
"I don't know, I don't know why…"
"Try to say why!"
"I wouldn't be able to make myself clear…"
"Is it because it happened so suddenly and was totally unexpected?"
"Don't ask."
But you want her to tell you! She says no. But you keep at her, keep taking it further, go on asking her. Is it because you've met by chance? Is it because you don't understand one another? Is it more exciting because you're strangers? Or does she simply seek after such thrills? She shakes her head each time to say no. She says she's known you a long time; even though many years have passed and she'd only seen you twice, your image stayed with her and grew more and more distinct. She also says that just now, a few hours ago, when she saw you she became excited. She says she doesn't casually go to bed with men, she isn't a slut, but she doesn't lack men either.
Don't hurt her like this… You're moved by her, need to be intimate with her and not just sexually. Hong Kong is a foreign place for you and for her. That small association with her is a memory from ten years ago on the other side of the sea, when you were still in China.
"It was in your home, one night in winter…"
"That home was confiscated a long time ago."
"Your home was warm, special, it had a warm feeling."
"It was warm air piped in by a generator. The pipes were always very hot. Even in winter, only a single layer of clothing was needed inside. The two of you arrived in big padded overcoats with upturned collars."
"We were worried about being seen and getting you in trouble-"
"Yes, the regular plainclothes police were on duty at the front of the building. They finished at ten o'clock at night. It was pretty awful for the next shift in the howling winter wind."
"It was Peter who suddenly thought to drop in on you, without phoning. You were old friends, he said, and as he was taking me to your home it was best going at night to avoid being stopped and questioned."
"I didn't have a line installed because I didn't want friends talking carelessly on the phone, and also to avoid having anything to do with foreigners. Peter was an exception, he'd come to China to study Chinese. At the time he was passionate about Mao's Cultural Revolution and we used to argue often, but he'd been a friend for some time. How is he?"
"We separated long ago. He was a representative in the China office of a German company, found a Chinese girl, married her, and took her back to Germany. I heard that he's now the boss of a company he had started up. Back then, I'd only just arrived in Beijing to study. I didn't speak much Chinese and it was hard to make Chinese friends."
"I remember you, of course I remember you. As soon as you came through the door you took off your big padded coat and your scarf, and there stood a very beautiful young foreign woman!"
"With big breasts, right?"
"Of course, very big breasts. Blushing white skin and bright red lips even with no lipstick. Really sexy."
"You couldn't have known at the time!"
"You were so bright red, it was impossible not to notice."
"It was because it was too hot in the room and we'd been cycling for more than an hour."
"That night you sat quietly opposite me but didn't say much."
"I was struggling to understand what was being said. You and Peter were talking all the time, although I don't recall what about. I didn't know much Chinese at the time but I remember that night, I had a strange feeling."
You, of course, also remember that winter night, you had candles burning, which added to the warmth, and you couldn't tell if there was anyone downstairs watching your window. You had finally obtained a little apartment, a decent refuge, a home, and you had a fortress to protect yourself from the political storms outside. She sat on the carpet with her back against the bookcase. It was a clipped woollen carpet made for export, that had gone on the domestic market. Sold at a reduced price as a second-grade product, it was still expensive, exactly the amount of advance royalty you had received for your book. However, that book, which did not so much as touch on politics, stirred up a great deal of trouble for you. Her shirt collar was open and her skin was very white, and those long legs in sleek black stockings were enticing.
"Don't forget, you had a girl in your apartment. She was wearing very little and, unless I've remembered wrongly, she was barefoot."
"She was usually naked, and she was when the two of you came in the door."
"That's right, we had been sitting and drinking for some time before the girl quietly came out of the bedroom."
"You two were obviously not going to leave right away. I asked her to join us, so she put on a dress."
"She shook hands with us but didn't say a thing all night."
"Like you."
"That night was very special, I had never seen a Chinese home with that sort of atmosphere…"
"It was special because a white German girl with bright red lips had suddenly arrived…"
"And there was also a barefoot little Beijing girl who was lovely and slender…"
"Flickering candlelight…"
"We sat drinking in your warm, cozy apartment as we listened to the howling wind outside."
"It was unreal, just like it is now, and probably there are also people watching…"
You again think that the room is probably being videotaped.
"Is it still unreal?"
She clamps you with her legs and you close your eyes to experience her, hugging the fullness of her body and mumbling, "There was no need to go before morning…"
"Of course, there wasn't…" she says. "At the time, I didn't want to leave. It was a bitterly cold winter night and we had to cycle for an hour. Peter wanted to go, and you didn't try to get us to stay."
"Yes, that's right." You say that it was the same with you. You had to cycle back with her to the barracks.
"What barracks?"
You say that she was a nurse in the army hospital and she couldn't stay out overnight.
She lets go of you and asks, "Who are you talking about?"
You're talking about her army hospital being in the barracks in the outer suburbs of Beijing. She used to come every Sunday morning, and on the Monday morning before three o'clock you had to set off and cycle for more than two hours to get her back to the barracks before dawn.
Shrinking back, she pushes you away, sits up and asks, "Are you talking about that Chinese girl?"
You open your eyes and see her glaring at you. You apologize and explain that it was she who started talking about the little lover you had at the time.
"Do you long for her a lot?"
After pondering, you say, "That's in the remote past. We lost contact long ago."
"And you've had no news about her?" She sits on her haunches.
"No." You also move away from her and sit on the edge of the bed.
"Don't you want to look for her?"
You say that China is already very distant from you. She says she understands. You say you have no homeland. She says her father is German but her mother is a Jew, so she has no homeland either. But she can't get away from her memories. You ask her why not? She says she isn't like you, she's a woman. You say oh, and stop talking.