"But I can't leave my sister, any more than she can leave me," GaoLing said.
"Don't argue," I told her, "I'm older than you. You go first, then I'll go to Hong Kong in a month or so and wait for the sponsorship papers to come through."
GaoLing was supposed to argue that she should be the one to wait in Hong Kong. But instead she asked, "Is that how long it takes to sponsor another person? Only one month?"
And though I had no idea how long it took, I said, "Maybe it's even quicker than that." I still thought she was going to agree to wait.
"That fast," GaoLing marveled. "Well, if it's that quick, I might as well go first, but only so I can leave that demon of a husband right away."
Just then Mrs. Riley came back to the room. "We've agreed," Sister Yu announced. "GaoLing will accompany Miss Grutoff to San Francisco."
I was too stunned to say anything. That night, I went over in my head how I had lost my chance. I was angry that GaoLing had tricked me. Then I had sisterly feelings and was glad she was going so she could get away from Fu Nan. Back and forth I went, between these two feelings. Before I fell asleep, I decided this was fate. Now whatever happened, that was my New Destiny.
Three days later, just before we left for Hong Kong, we had a little party. "There's no need for tears and good-byes," I said. "Once we're settled in the new country, we'll invite you all to come visit."
Teacher Pan said that he and his new wife would enjoy that very much, a chance to visit another country before their life was over. Sister Yu said she had heard much about dancing in America. She confessed that she had always wanted to learn how to dance. And for the rest of the evening, which was the last time we ever saw them, we took turns guessing and joking. Miss Grutoff would be healed, then come back to China, where she would make more orphan girls act in more bad plays. GaoLing would be rich, having finally found the right fortune-teller, one who could write with four brushes at once. And I would be a famous painter.
We toasted one another. Soon, maybe in a year or less, Sister Yu and Teacher Pan with his new wife would sail to America for a holiday. Gao-Ling and I would come to the harbor in San Francisco and wait for them in our new automobile, a shiny black one with many comfortable seats and an American driver. Before we drove them to our mansion on top of a hill, we would stop at a ballroom. And to celebrate our reunion, we all agreed, we would dance and dance and dance.
FRAGRANCE
Each night when I returned to the rooming house in Hong Kong, I lay on a cot with wet towels over my chest. The walls were sweating because I couldn't open the windows for fresh air. The building was on a fishy street on the Kowloon side. This was not the part where the fish were sold. There it smelled of the morning sea, salty and sharp. I was living in Kowloon Walled City, along the low point in a wide gutter, where the scales and blood and guts gathered, swept there by the fishmongers' buckets of water at night. When I breathed the air, it was the vapors of death, a choking sour stink that reached like fingers into my stomach and pulled my insides out. Forever in my nose, that is the fragrance of Fragrant Harbor.
The British and other foreigners lived on the Hong Kong Island side. But in Kowloon Walled City, it was almost all Chinese, rich and raggedy, poor and powerful, everyone different, but we all had this in common: We had been strong, we had been weak, we had been desperate enough to leave behind our motherland and families.
And there were also those who made money from people's despair. I went to many blind seers, the wenmipo who claimed they were ghost writers. "I have a message from a baby," they called. "A message from a son." "A husband." "An ancestor who is angry." I sat down with one and she told me, "Your Precious Auntie has already been reincarnated. Go three blocks east, then three blocks north. A beggar girl will cry out to you, 'Auntie, have pity, give me hope.' Then you will know it is she. Give her a coin and the curse will be ended." I did exactly as she said. And on that exact block, a girl said those exact words. I was so overjoyed. Then another girl said those words, another and another, ten, twenty, thirty little girls, all without hope. I gave them coins, just in case. And for each of them, I felt pity. The next day, I saw another blind lady who could talk to ghosts. She also told me where to find Precious Auntie. Go here, go there. The next day was the same. I was using up my savings, but I didn't think it mattered. Soon, any day now, I would leave for America.
After I had lived a month in Hong Kong, I received a letter from Gao-Ling:
"My Own True Sister, Forgive me for not writing you sooner. Teacher Pan sent your address to me, but I did not receive it right away, because I was moving from one church lady's house to another. I'm also sorry to tell you that Miss Grutoff died a week after we arrived. Right before she flew to heaven, she said she made a mistake coming back to America. She wanted to return to China so her bones could rest there, next to Miss Towler's. I was glad to know how much she loved China, and sorry because it was too late to send her back. I went to her funeral, but not too many people knew her. I was the only one who cried, and I said to myself, She was a great lady.
"My other news is not so good, either. I learned I cannot sponsor you, not yet. The truth is, I almost was not able to stay myself. Why we thought it would be so easy, I don't know. I see now we were foolish. We should have asked many more questions. But now I have asked the questions, and I know of several ways for you to come later. How much later depends.
"One way is for you to apply as a refugee. The quota for Chinese, however, is very low, and the number who want to get in is beyond count. To be honest, your chances are like a leak moving against a flood.
"Another way is for me to be a citizen first so I can sponsor you as my sister. You will have to claim that Mother and Father are your real mother and father, since I cannot sponsor a cousin. But as a relative, you would be in a different line, ahead of ordinary refugees. For me to become a citizen, however, means I have to learn English first and get a good job. I promise you I am studying very hard, in case this is the means I have to turn to.
"There is a third way: I can marry a citizen and then become a citizen faster. Of course, it is inconvenient that I am already married to Chang Fu Nan, but I think no one needs to know this. On my visa papers, I did not mention it. Also, you should know that when I applied for the visa, the visa man asked for documents as proof of my birth, and I said, 'Who has documents for such things?' He said, 'Oh, were they burned during the war like everyone else's?' I thought that was the correct answer, so I agreed this was true. When you prepare your visa papers, you must say the same thing. Also make yourself five years younger, born 1921. I already did, born 1922, but in the same month as the old birthday. This will give you extra time to catch up.
"Mother and Father have already written to ask me to send them my extra money. I have had to write back and say I have none. If I do in the future, of course, I will send some to you. I feel so guilty that you insisted I come first and I gave in to your demands. Now it is you who are stuck, not knowing what to do. Don't mistake my meaning. Life here is not so easy. And making money is not like we imagined. All those stories of instant riches, don't believe them. As for dancing, that is only in the movies. Most of the day, I clean houses. I am paid twenty-five cents. That may sound like a lot, but it costs that much to eat dinner. So it is hard to save money. For you, of course, I am willing to starve.
"In his last letter, Father said he almost died of anger when he learned that Fu Nan lost the ink business in Peking. He said Fu Nan has returned to Immortal Heart and is lying around useless, but the Chang father is not being critical, saying Fu Nan is a big war hero, lost two fingers, saved lives. You know what I was thinking when I read that. Most terrible of all, our family still has to supply the inksticks and ink cakes, and we receive none of the profit, only a lesser debt. Everyone has had to take on various home businesses, weaving baskets, mending, doing menial labor that makes Mother complain that we have fallen as low as the tenants. She asks me to hurry and become rich, so I can pull her out of the bowels of hell.