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本帖最后由 何木 于 2014-10-23 21:59 编辑
Part VI
Chapter 66 1/2
At the lawyer’s, they signed their names many times on the divorce paperwork, swiftly, or half-heartedly; he couldn’t remember any other times when his signature had been so much in demand.
She didn’t cry, until she stepped into the car. Quietly she wiped her tears, turning her head away from him. The half hour trip was, to their lives, a grey time and space, where the end wrapped the beginning, and the past was shadowing the future.
He lived in the same house for another two months, during which, more like friends, they were polite to each other, and pampered their daughter, helplessly, as if to distract, or ignore their own sadness. Then Qiuyan told him one evening, that he had better move out, for she didn’t feel good with him under the same roof.
So one afternoon, he dumped almost all the books, and many clothes that, in his opinion, were good enough for many in the world, but not so on himself. Indeed, at least his past was unwanted, if not everything. And all he had packed up fitted in just a medium size case.
He opened the door, of which handle had been a kin to his hand for many years. And the weather today was his friend, for it was drizzling. Qiuyan was in her bedroom. He called Adina, to hug her.
‘Where are you going, Daddy?’ she asked.
He squatted down, holding her shoulder and her little hand. ‘Daddy is going for a business journey. You listen to Mum, do your homework carefully, okay? I will be back on Saturday,’ he said, with a smile.
But Adina sensed something, and her tears were quick. ‘Don’t go, Daddy.’
‘No, no, I am not going.’ He arose and cuddled her, to obscure his own face. ‘Go to Mum, all right?’
‘Okay.’ Now she was better.
‘Good.’ He patted her cheek. He smiled again, and released her from him. Just as she opened the door of her mother’ bedroom, Bing waved her an extra ‘Bye, Adina.’
She turned to him, and amazingly she grinned, as she did for his usual departure, ‘Bye, Daddy’.
Oh, she was a crystal. But he was confused. Did she really sense anything at all? Did her tears of a moment ago really come out of the same pool of sorrow as his?
He stood on the path, looking around. ‘Bye, bye, grass, and plants,’ he said, to the lawn, and the row of roses.
Then a sudden lightness came to him. His heart was emptying. His blood seemed to float. He felt he had gone back many years, when his father left him on the train in Mianyang station, or when he was dismissed by his employer in Artarmon.
Ah, a life, had drifted so far, attached, and detached, and bobbed, and alone.
The freedom was sad. The soft damp air filled his lungs, cool or cold, in tranquillity.
He pondered at his car, now his biggest material item. It was a drab car. But it was drivable, and estimable, and intimate, like worn shoes.
So he was in the car, or in a bin. The drizzle smudged the glass. He let the wipers do the job, that made two joint windows, through which he saw the smoke of his future.
Gu Hun Ye Gui – a lone soul wild ghost, he felt, he was, on his way to wash his car.
The washing machine had spidery limbs. A mini storm and thunder shrouded the car, darkening and encapsulating him. For the moment, he was a pupa in a cocoon, a baby in woman’s womb, a body in a tomb.
Yes, he could go to Vivian, or Pan. Weren’t they both divorced? He could marry one of them. Or, even better, go between them? Ah, what luxury, and what a man! And bye, bye, marriage, and responsibility, and love, and prison. At least he still breathes, and has a car, not like those who have died from tsunami, or earthquake, or 9/11 terrorist attack, or diabetes, or cancer.
After only ten minutes he was reset, as fresh as the car itself.
His new home in Baulkham Hills had a single bed, a computer desk, an internet socket, a dustbin, and a wardrobe. It was small but enough for him.
On his first morning in his new place, he sat up leaning against the bed board, which was rather short, and listened to the birds that sing alike in everywhere in Australia. He was single again, a horse without bridle, all on his own feet, and would fetch rice or bread with his own hands making a living.
In another minute his mood was lifted, and he felt ridiculously happy, so that he almost jumped out of the bed.
And after all, many things remained the same. The tone and boredom of ‘Hi’ and ‘How are you?’, and ‘I am good’ and ‘Thank you’ between him and his colleagues, were not altered, nor did the chair that had warmed his buttocks for all these years.
However as soon as he left the office at the end of the day, his life was standing different. He didn’t have to go home, either because his new place was not sufficiently as a home, or because he was allowed to go anywhere else but home.
But where to go? No matter where he went, he had to deal with his stomach; where and what to eat? Yesterday evening, he ate fast food; today’s lunch was a burger. For today’s supper he could do with the fast food again. And this weekend he would go shopping, and get things ready, and pick up his cooking skills. He used to be a kitchen hand, and a dishwasher, and a restaurant supervisor in the city of Melbourne. It was not as if he lacked experience in that sort of thing.
So he sat in his car for many minutes, thinking of the trivial things, undecided upon how to kill a night that became naked at his own hands.
Huh, if only Pan or Vivian were here in Sydney! Or, maybe he could grab some friends for company? But in Sydney he didn’t have any single bachelor friends. Therefore, only Jim or Brian could fulfil this purpose, if he liked, though they were both rather family men. And it seemed an age had passed since they got together last time, and he had not yet told either of them about his change of status.
But most likely, Jim was on the road. So he called Brian.
‘Hey, Wang Bing,’ Brian sounded delighted. ‘It has been a long time since we last spoke. How are things?’
‘Not too bad, how about you?’
‘Well, my life is a day’s to multiply N times.’
‘Haha,’ Bing was amused. ‘Brian, I am going to give you a chance of replacing N with M.’
‘What do you mean? Some fun?’
‘Yes.’
‘Then come to my home for dinner, let’s have a drink,’ he said, and laughed, ‘my boys badly miss your daughter.’
‘No, I’m in the mood to go to a bar in the city. You go with me?’
‘What? A bar? Where?’
‘Well, a lot of them in the city.’
‘Why? Can’t we just drink at home?’
‘No, I want to tell you something very private.’
‘Are you serious?’ Brian was still not moved. ‘Why?’
Now nearly in desperation, Bing ordered, ‘I will later tell you why, now go and ask Christina for leave.’
‘Okay, okay, hang on a second,’ Brian was yielding, but it took him nearly sixty seconds instead of one for his positive answer. Brian, at home, was regarded as a model of husband, doing cooking and cleaning most of the time. He was often quoted as a good example by Qiuyan when she complained of Bing’s laziness at domestic chores.
At the railway station, the two classmates met. Their steps were bouncing; their spirits seemed to hover over their heads. Really today they would go together to a bar, which had never happened before.
The city street was vibrant, bearing the shoes or boots and the gravity of moving people; some of them were very fat, though others could just be a bunch of skins and bones.
The bar they went into, at this early hour, was nice and quiet, though the smell of alcohol was tempting just the same. The lights were glowing, faint enough to expand one’s emotion; the music, whatever it was, was working hard to spur one’s feelings on. The bartender, idle and listless a moment earlier, turned alive, as soon as they reached the counter, with her bosom heaving in admirable shape. They asked her for two glasses of VB, and watched the liquid shooting out of the tap, with good noise and swelling white foam, into one then another, and one then another again. While all this time Bing’s eyes enjoyed very much the great western womanhood in her front.
They also asked for two bags of roasted peanuts. As Chinese, they were inclined to drink with the company of some sort of food.
So they began to drink, and ate, and before long Brian asked, ‘Now tell me your private something.’
‘Why? Must we have something to stay together?’
‘Of course not,’ Brian said. ‘But I know you do have a thing to tell, come on, what is it?’
Bing only said, ‘After two glasses of beer.’
‘Fine,’ Brian laughed. ‘I am always patient, either at home, or in the bar.’
They were never so close to each other, and exuberant. At their third glass, Brian requested, ‘Now.’
‘Promise,’ Bing looked solemnly at him, ‘do not drop your jaw on hearing what I am about to tell you.’
‘Haha, okay.’
‘And also promise, you don’t tell Christina of whatever you have heard from me tonight.’
Brian nodded his head, ‘I promise.’
‘I got divorced.’
In spite of what he had just said, Brain was still gaping, astounded, ‘What? Divorce? With Qiuyan?’
‘Whom else could I divorce?’ He was astonished with Brian’s astonishment. ‘Well, just a divorce, haven’t you heard of the word at all?’
‘But, how? Tell me you are just kidding.’
‘No, I am not kidding. It is a long story. It will take three days and three nights to tell,’ Bing chuckled. ‘Can you afford the time with that?’
‘Come on,’ Brian was losing his friendly patience. ‘Quick, what happened!’
‘Okay, be patient, for goodness’s sake, it is just a divorce.’
‘Yeah, just a divorce, you sound like it’s just fast food, quick and simple?’
‘Yes, just a divorce, but you know it is never quick and simple.’
‘So what? What was the cause? Oh, my god, do you have a Xiao San - mistress? In Australia? Who is it?’
‘Hang on, I won’t tell you her name until we have more drinks,’ Bing said, resolutely, which must have dampened the eagerness of his friend.
‘I know you just want me to drink. Okay, I will, as a Chinese proverb has said, to accompany a man of honour at the risk my life,’ said Brian.
Bing laughed, ‘Don’t worry, I won’t risk your life,’ surveying Brian’s face, which reddened easily with drink.
‘But I can’t drink as much as you do, you know,’ said Brian.
‘It was Vivian,’ Bing revealed, abruptly, and inadvertently.
‘What? Vivian? What news!’ Brian bit his thick lips hard. ‘No, no, but she is in China.’
‘Well, aren’t all Xiao San residing in China?’
‘Come on, do not let me wait any longer.’ Brian’s face was now crimson, earning sympathy from Bing, who, unprepared but well affected by alcohol, spent the next quarter of hour recounting his recent story with Vivian.
‘Haha, you guys have been playing secrets,’ Brian’s eyes glittered under the flashing lights. ‘Just as you did at university. Amazing, do you still love each other, after all these years?’
‘How can I know?’
‘Huh, someone said, don’t talk about love after forty years old. Maybe it is not true in your case?’
‘Well, you are in the same age group. What do you think?’ Bing rebuffed. ‘Do you love Christina?’
‘Me?’ Brian pointed to himself. ‘I am traditional, really, living like many on earth. Day in, day out, but hah, we make love once a week, so it must have been love, otherwise why don’t we call it “make sex”?’
Bing was very amused, ‘Ah, make sex, what a point! Do you make sex to her, or the opposite? That is different, fundamentally.’
‘It is a pure exercise, and you don’t do it on your own. Well, I mean, after you got a wife,’ Brian grinned, relaxed. ‘She said it was good to consume the fat on her waist. So you must know now who makes the thing.’
‘So you must help her and do it more than once a week,’ Bing chuckled, ‘for a task so paramount to her.’
‘But then I will lose too much.’
‘Then drink more beer, to gain and match her on the waist.’
‘A good idea,’ Brian laughed, and Bing wondered why he hadn’t befriended him so much at university.
‘Anyway, you are a model husband, and Christina is very happy, that is the main thing. ’
‘Well, I have no other choice, not like you, very lucky, able to take Vivian, young and mature.’ Brian rubbed his mouth harshly, with his hand. ‘But, well, I’m very surprised, Vivian has retained her charm, and, heihei, you know how jealous all your classmates were of you?’
‘Don’t tell me you also had an eye for her.’
‘Why not? She was the best in the whole department if not in the university!’ Brian was now chewing a peanut. ‘You know, in those days, we all wished we could play a instrument or two, in order to flirt a bit somewhat like you.’
‘But now I have paid my price, haven’t I?’
‘Well, price? What price? It depends on how you see it,’ Brian was becoming less and less his usual self, ‘I had my first love as well,’ and like a loud musing, he didn’t stop there, ‘It was at my high school, I lost my virginity.’
Bing’s curiosity was now at its peak, though he showed it very little on his face. ‘Does Christina know your story?’ he asked, noting Brian was appearing somehow detached from the scene. He won’t ask him to drink any more, he decided.
And Brian didn’t answer him. Instead he finished his beer, and showed up his glass. ‘Bottoms up, let me get two more,’ he said, arising and walking, or striding towards the counter.
Bing was quite touched. Brian’s confidence in him had never been expected. And it was actually the first time Bing had ever perceived Brian so closely, whose soul must have had little chance to peep out in this new country, that seemed to have cut off his golden years of life.
A minute later Brian came back, and drank, and said, ‘That was crazy, I was like a drugged person, going really crazy. But, huh, I was not too sure if she also liked me or not. I was too excited, unable to sleep, thrilled, always thinking of her. Then we were together, at last. And too bad, though we tried many times, I always finished too quick, before we had ever begun, haha, not even…well, you know what I mean. Ha, what a shame, nothing like some junky videos I’ve watched. And it was always like that, swirling swirling, like a cyclone, then it died off, suddenly, nothing, absolutely nothing, like I was a bird, shot down.
‘But she was very nice. I loved her so much, well, I thought so, but it didn’t work, still. Every time I touched her, I was conscious of my previous failures. But I wanted to prove myself. You know. I was afraid, every day, so that made it even worse. So finally, I gave it up, hiding myself from her, see, haha, that was my first love. It was a bad story, wasn’t it? Of course, not as fantastic as yours with Vivian.’
Bing, as if to compliment his confession, told him a bit about his first struggle with Fang. So that Brian continued his story, ‘The bad experience actually haunted me for many years, many. And I continued to fail in exact the same way with two more girls, with whom I thought I was very much in love. Until I met Christina at my company. She was not beautiful, well, not so that I was immediately attracted to her. I was not very excited, less caring. Then she cured me. She helped me recover my confidence. The first time with her was successful, I felt myself to be normal, at last, as a man. And then every time with her was successful.
‘See, hah, love and sex, what are they, they were against each other in me. I can’t have a passion, too much for me to handle. Sometimes I wonder whether I could, and should do it again with my first love, now that I am more mature and more capable a man? It is not that I didn’t attempt this when I last went back to China. I called her, and we did managed to meet for dinner. But strangely enough, the way we behaved was just like we were classmates. And she had changed so much. I couldn’t find any trace of my infatuation like I had in high school. I believed she regarded me the same way.
‘See, I said that you are lucky,’ Brian said, his smoky eyes twinkling.
‘But, lucky for what, now as a homeless, wandering soul?’
‘I understand, but I wondered more how Qiuyan could handle this?’
‘Well,’ Bing stammered.
‘She is very beautiful, actually, in some ways more than Vivian.’
‘They are different.’
‘Have you told Vivian that you are divorced?’
‘Nope, things have happened too quickly. I never wanted a divorce. If a marriage was something a man had to go through any way, then why divorce? At our age, we fully understand a marriage won’t be able to keep an enthusiasm, no matter what. In fact, I didn’t feel much to do with her, although she was the obvious trigger of all the consequence. Our Sydney meeting was treated as kind of one night stand. Neither of us had thought anything more than that.’
Brian sighed, and made a remark, ‘Maybe we shouldn’t have met each other in the Flemington Market.’
Bing caught his hint, and laughed, ‘Well, who knows what, even a life, or anything, is a random occurrence.’
More people swarmed into the bar. The music was now much louder; the lights were flickering more frequently. But Bing seemed to have heard Brian’s mobile ringing. ‘Is it your mobile?’ he asked.
Brian fumbled clumsily in his pocket, and took it out. But it had already stopped. He then checked and exclaimed, ‘Oh, my god, I have nine missed calls.’
So Brian went outside to call back his wife, and before long they finished the night and went home.
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