《On The Same Days》橄榄树

26、6th December Friday 2002 Shenyang

　　It was May’s birthday; Ling decided to dismiss her class 10 minutes earlier than normal.
　　Off the building she dashed, to the Cake Shop two streets further down the Peoples square. Peanut cake of that shop was May’s favorite. Usually it is rather quiet , because it’s a rather expensive store. But that day there were quite many people queuing in the small shop. All the cakes were on sale, 20 percent discount. So that was the reason. The shop assistant was smiling sweetly with “All cakes are on sale, 20 percent discount,”
　　But Ling didn’t want any discounted cakes for May, she wanted an original one with original flavor and value, so did she asked the shop assistant, “Do you still have any non-discounted cakes?”
　　The smiles of the shop assistant and the cashier behind the counter were both frozen for a moment, “Miss, the cakes were newly baked, today we are giving special offers…” they tried to explain.
　　“Ok, I’d like to have 2 peanut cakes; would you please charge me the normal price?”
　　Smile of the cashier was gone, frowning instead: “Sorry, according to the rules if we charge you more, we’d be in trouble.”
　　Some other customers behind Ling were murmuring with irritation, “go to other places if she wants no discount,” “how ridiculous!”
　　“Next please!” The cashier ran out of her patience and shouted at the next customer behind Ling.

　　Out of her stubbornness; Ling went to another cake shop. Why everything has to be discounted? Sometimes it is not even discount but a trick, a cake may just worth actually that 80% of the original price, but they tagged the original price on purposely 20 percent higher just to allow the fake discount.

　　Even in the talent fair where they recruit new teachers for □□, there came so many bachelors, sometimes even masters in their smart pack, with perfect CV and references, as if they were just ready to conquer the world from any corner, even a □□ would do, yet when it comes to demonstrating a lecture, not many could really make themselves understood in English. On the other hand, □□ was doing the same thing, just promoting through the talent fair, saying that any enthusiastic young elites who were dreaming to end up at the top of a career □□ have to come to the □□, where they’d get chances to be trained and promoted and discover a whole new world. Which was partly true, they just intentionally left a few key words out, new applicants would be trained to be patient, promoted to be temporary babysitters.

　　“Linda, thanks a lot for the cake, but you knew I am on diet, you must still be taking revenge on me for the other day.” May’s eyes twinkling at the cakes.
　　“While then, take a break. If you are really so obsessed of shape, go to Holland then, where you’d be seen as a bony beauty, though they mightn’t consider bony as beauty.”
　　“Don’t even mention that, otherwise I am even more urged to nip and choke him.” May face clouded again.
　　It seemed no girls in love would ever be happy all the time, Tina realized. Frankly, among her circle, it seemed, the contrary is true, the unhappy moments prevailed. “Not again? I don’t believe Fan ever dares to forget your birthday at all. What he didn’t do this time?”

　　“This time what he’s going to do will be the huge problem. He wants to go to Shanghai, not for a visit, but to look for a job and work there. He had a good friend who went there a few years ago and he is doing quite well there. Besides, you know more about the situation in Sunshine Construction than I do.”

　　“Lee is considering privatizing Sunshine Construction and makes some changes; he wouldn’t enjoy losing an arm, but that is his problem. When will Fan go and what are you going to do then?”

　　“I’d preferred if he was going to Holland, but, some changes of life are always good. We will probably leave in February after the Spring Festival. This means I won’t be here for long anymore with you in □□.” It sounded like May was talking about completely someone else’s life, calm about it all.

　　“Are you serious that you are giving up on all what you have achieved in □□? Leave your position empty for that peacock? I can’t believe this! How do your parents think about it all? How does Fan’s family think about his decision? Are you going to give an engagement party before you go? Do you have any idea what can you do over there? I mean if it is easy to find a job?”

　　“Linda, I seriously suggest you to spend as less time as possible with all those family ancients of yours, you are talking worse than my mother now. She was even more enthusiastic about it than I do. She’d have a free accommodation if she wants to shop in Shanghai, she said that is the only place better than the whole South Korea and she’d tell all her families with proud where her daughter works and lives. Fan’s parents weren’t happy that Fan will give up his state employee status, but they weren’t happy with Sunshine Construction either, they almost never feel happy about anything at all, so who cares?”

　　“But your job? □□? You didn’t even mention it; you love it so much I know it.”

　　“I still do. But you also know that we can’t stay jumping in front of these babies for ever, besides it is a □□ with limited height, in Shenyang area I can’t climb any higher any more. Since there would be a change in the near future anyway, I wouldn’t mind to change it now, so that Fan would be happy and always feels that he owes me a career.” May half joked, she never did anything for free. He’d better pay her a loyal bright future for her sacrifice. “Do you have any slightest interest in my position in □□?”

　　“Sorry, don’t recommend me, it is not my cup of tea, I may not stay long either.” Maybe she should really consider Lee’s suggestion to work for him later on, if May even knew □□ wouldn’t be a place for the long term.

　　“Linda, I am sorry that I did drag you in, two years ago I firmly believed that □□ would be just the place where we could spend our whole lives.’
　　“So far I have been happy and like the job very much. You just said changes are always good. When are you going to tell the manager?”
　　“Not until everything is definite, somewhere in January, since we all work on temporary terms without contract, there are no 3 months notice necessary. By the way, don’t tell other colleagues yet.”
　　“Okay. There would be no engagement party then?”
　　“No. But there will be a little wedding party.”
　　“A what?!! Are you getting married in two months?”
　　“We are not going to rent two separate rooms, marriage is just a legal form, and we decided not to make it into a big thing, just his family and my family, if you really want, you may come too.”
　　“This is unbelievable, you are the first one among us 10 who gets married!”
　　“Maybe also the first one who gets divorced?”
　　“Hi, marry the chicken, follow the chicken; marry the dog, follow the dog. Fan is a nice person; I do believe you will be happy with him.”
　　“Thanks a lot, matchmaker, in case we won’t be happy at all, beating each other dead, we’d thank you for that too.”
　　“I am not that sure how long Fan would be able to put up with you though.”

　　“By the way, how long can you still put up with private lectures for that somebody’s grandson? How is Bamboo’s job?” May knew how much Ling hated to go through those backdoors, if it wasn’t for Bamboo, Ling would never do it for herself.
　　May hated it too, that was partly why she liked the idea of going south, so far as she heard, competition is more transparent there, and a person’s skills and capabilities spoke more than connections.

　　“I am dying. The dreadful thing is that we never mentioned how long this is going to be. It was all vague, how can I ever put an end to this? That little devil is killing all my passion of being a soul engineer for children.”
　　“Can’t you suggest to somebody that it is better for the devil to come and join the lectures at □□?”
　　“I have only seen him once together with Lily; en decided I’d never ever work for any governmental bodies. I have no chance to talk with anybody except babysitter of that house.” Ling tried to forget the whole scene. That was the first time she ever saw the other side of Lily, a sweet and humble one who brought load gifts and complimented all decorations of that stink house of that stink huge fat ball panting in his bed, suffering from a kind of rich- over-nutritional- sickness or alike. Ling couldn’t manage anything to say with Lily on the way out, she lost all her words.

　　“Tell the devil about the Christmas party, I am sure he would like to come, he will ask the rot family himself to join then.”
　　“He’d better do, otherwise the rot family might think I am planning to kidnap that devil.”

　　* * *
　　Later in the evening, with her heavy canvas bag on the shoulder, Ling went to the bus station. She agreed with Bamboo to meet them up at the hospital where Deng would have his chemical treatment.
　　It was snowing heavily. The road had been always covered by a few inches of whitish icy snow ever since the first snow fall. Nobody bothered to clean it just for a day or so before it’s all covered again. Over time the old layers of snow were get smashed hard on the ground with traffics and became a concrete top layer of the road. But whenever fresh snow falls on the old layers again, it’s real disastrous to walk, or drive.
　　Cars were crawling very slowly. Ling cautiously crossed the People’s square; feeling snow flakes blowing into her face, dripping into her neck. Trembling in the cold with a red nose, Ling remembered Tina’s gray face when she left. The poor girl was broken after back from that village, no heating system in house under this kind of weather, no shower house in the whole village, no in house toilet, no gas cooking plate, no post office, no bank, no nothing, people fight with their lives for 50 RMB or a bad word.
　　Ling saw an old shabby man digging into the garbage tank at the corner, for some cola tins probably; a few dozens of those tins would worth a few cents. Tina told that could be any of her village man, even her own father. The pain on Tina face hurt Ling. Ling had always felt her life, her family’s life were just trivial and meaningless, yet the villagers were hopelessly fighting just to get close to where these city dwellers were.
　　Aren’t people ever satisfied for just being whom they were? She thought about Bamboo’s job, Deng’s cancer, about Tiffany’s and Roc fight over money, her parent’s eagerness of settle the 3 daughters down, May’s fight with her future mother in law, even that somebody and his devil grandson, they must be lonely up there as well, they might never get any honest compliments…
　　Who was better than the other? Yet everyone kept their head down, and looking at their own toes, wishing to climb the never ending □□ till the very top spot. If there was no end to the desire, how could one reach the end of the □□? Shouldn’t one just be happy at who he is and what he had? Ling knew they all considered her lacking in ambitions, she never wanted to go abroad or to South China for a huge career, she indeed never had those ambitions to be something, she just wanted to be happy, that was all. Sometimes she had no idea if she was happy, she had no idea if she was there at all, she only saw all the moments of family dinners, her parents, her sisters, Lily and her students in all her mental screens, never herself.

　　Slowly walking along a few tea eggs (no, not tea bags, but eggs spoiled in salty tea) and popcorn stands, Ling blew some warm air to her frozen fingers through the gloves. A young man sitting on a chair behind some paintings was doing the same. “Nice cold weather, isn’t it?”
　　Ling had to smile, no one really enjoys the cold; he might want to sell some of his paintings. She walked closer and bended for a better check. Those weren’t exactly paintings, but artistic signatures. In different forms of calligraphy, some names were painted in the form of flowers and birds in different colors, nice and special. But the snow kept following down on the papers, some paints were already started to get wet and fade.

　　“Why haven’t you got a plastic shed for them, see, the moon here is fading away.” Ling had asked,
　　“The moon will never fade away, it is just we don’t see it anymore.” He laughed, with a small eyed, red nosed face, “the old lady selling sunflower seeds and popcorns borrowed my tent, she can’t lose her property to the weather.”

　　For a moment Ling really wanted to give this man a big hug, such an ordinary person who had to sit in the cold snow to make a living knew that the moon would never fade, the moon is out there shinning as ever, it is people who sometimes lost the sight of it.

　　Ling asked for a dozen signatures for the whole family, the man insisted to give her some discount, she insisted to pay the full price. Contently holding the pack of paintings she stepped into the bus to the hospital.

　　* * *
　　“Have you run mad? Why are you wasting money on all these rubbish? It is just a different form of begging, isn’t it?” Bamboo went through the pack and laughing at her little sister.
　　“No, I have just come to my senses. It wasn’t begging, it is art!” Ling handed over her huge canvas bag to Deng and went to the toilet downstairs.

　　Her belly started aching, a signal for the monthly torture, her period. No matter what, Ling decided to born as a boy in next life, not only to satisfy his father’s dream of having a son, also to avoid the monthly physical torture. It was simply not fair, Ling complained to herself, although the moon might be always there, a few days of every month a woman would be physically deprived of the interest to notice the moon at all.

　　Someone was vomiting in the next toilet. Tina felt nauseas at the sounds. Washed her hands, she quickly went out, before she could close the door, the sick person came out of the other toilet also, with swollen red eyes, it was Lily.
　　“God, what happened? Lily, are you all right?” Ling was shocked, Lily was as pale as a sheet, was it some eye disease?
　　“Ling?!” Lily shouted even more shocked, Ling couldn’t help but wonder if she had got some artistic tattoo signature on her forehead that frightened Lily this much.

　　“What is wrong with your eyes?” Ling automatically searched her tissue; then remembered she had given the bag to Deng.
　　“Nothing, I just had a bad stomach, I am ok. You can go.” Lily was never so cold; Ling got a bit scared, not another cancer patient again? Wasn’t one enough in one family?
　　“Lily, you have to tell me what is going on, or we may go upstairs to Bamboo and Deng, you need to drink something.”
　　“Please don’t, Ling, don’t tell them; don’t tell anyone that you saw me here, I have been drunk and I had a bad stomach and terrible hangover, I have to go home…” without finishing her words, one hand on her throat, Lily dashed into the toilet again, vomiting. Ling walked up to Lily in a flash, stood aside with one hand on Lily’s back, without knowing what to do, “Lily, shall we go to the doctor? Or shall I fetch Bamboo and Deng to send you home?”
　　For a moment, Lily couldn’t talk. “Ling, promise you’d never tell anyone what you saw, tell Bamboo that you have met a roommate and you need to send her home. Then call a Taxi for me.”

　　Nodded at the serious pale face of Lily, Ling went back upstairs, fetched her bag, lied to Bamboo, called a taxi, and helped Lily back home.
　　Lily kept silent the whole evening, huddled at the corner of her couch holding the cushions, blew boxes of tissues away, two eyes became two big rotten peaches.
　　Ling didn’t dare to ask, she ordered take away, but none of them ever touched the chopsticks, she had to put them all in the fridge.
　　Ling felt cold. The inspiration from the snow man with his artistic signature and the ever shinning moon all felt so far way, like ages ago. She had no idea what to expect from Lily, she never saw her aunt cry like this since her earliest memory.
　　Lily had always been a strong person, fought her own way up in that dark political circle from nowhere, never lost control over her single status, always helped her family whenever any of them ran into problems. Ling couldn’t bear any of those dreadful thoughts, she started to cry too.

　　Saw Ling’s tears, Lily managed a very ugly smile, “Ling, I have no cancer. I am not dying. There might be someone dying, but not me.”
　　“?????” Ling looked at her aunt with a puzzled face.
　　“Sorry, Ling, to get you involved. You will consider it as a dirty accident, I am pregnant. That is all.”
　　“Ooh!” Ling breathed with a huge relief, which shocked Lily another time.
　　“Aren’t you going to abuse me and looking down upon me?” Lily still couldn’t believe Ling’s reaction, her niece out of a black and white world.
　　“I was so scared that we all are going to lose you. God, anything is just better than that.” Then the information sank, Ling became open-mouthed again, Lily was pregnant?! “But how, I mean, who, when…what are you going to do?”
　　“I don’t know. I really don’t know.” Lily’s tears dripping again.
　　“Can you talk with the father about it? Get married or something.” Ling cautious suggested. This wasn’t really her topic; she had completely no idea either how to comfort Lily, she had some vague idea that Lily was seeing someone, but not publicly, but, pregnancy?”

　　“He has a wife and a son. He’d never get a divorce. He can’t risk his position with such a scandal.” Lily said in a hollow voice.
　　Ling opened her mouth; shut it up again, no sure what to say.
　　“Did I crash your world again? You aunt wasn’t a saint after all.”
　　“Nobody is. Have you told him?”
　　“No, I just knew a few minutes earlier before you spotted me. I need time to think.”
　　“Lily, why him? You could have chosen anybody…”
　　“I have asked myself thousands of times. It is never as simple as that. We knew each other from work. I knew he was married from the very beginning. But he understood me as nobody ever did, he knew how to take care of me and comfort me. I was totally lost, in him, in his mature manner, his way of socializing. We both tried very hard to hold back our feelings, we knew it is wrong. Yet it happened. I was too careless; I should never allow myself to be pregnant. A child without a father would never survive this world.”

　　Ling came to sit next to the shaking Lily, held Lily’s hands in her own, feeling lost. She knew for long already that the world wasn’t just black and white, yet there were far too many complications beyond her understanding. If it was a mistake, whose responsibility was it? If it wasn’t a mistake, why couldn’t Lily just be a happy mother as any other pregnant woman should be?

　　Ling remembered the other day she told Jane, who cried at some naughty boy’s curse motherless, to love people around her, to leave the misunderstanding to time; there’d be a day that she’d grown up and understand everything, that everything will be just all right. Ling felt like she was cheating, even today, a few days away from being 24, she still got a lot to comprehend, would there ever be the day that everything will really turn out to be all right?

　　She should be happy though, that her father did love the tiny Jane very much. He hadn’t played with a child for a rather long time since the day Ling went to middle school. Jane never knew a grandfather either. So Ling’s father showed Jane around the little town, told her stories about horses, donkeys, pigs and chickens. They baked some sweet potatoes on fire, played 5 points chess. Ling’s father even taught Jane some ancient military songs. His father did the same trick with Jane as with his daughters years ago, losing to Jane just one or two points, a few sessions later, Jane became very proud of her chess skills, then he started to cheat, a few sessions later, Jane leaned how to cheat as well.
　　Then Ling’s father told the old story again, about the two cats playing on the roof. Accidentally they both fell into the chimney. When they came out, one cat had a dirty face covered with dark ashes; the other one’s face was clean. At the sight of the dirty cat, the clean cat thought he himself was also dirty and dark, so he ran to the river and cleaned his face.
　　At the sight of the clean cat, the dirty cat thought he himself was also clean. So he went on the street without washing up, other cats were all scared away.

　　Ling’s father concluded “Never take other people as mirrors, otherwise even talented people may turn into fool, good people may turn into bad, you have to be your own mirror.”

　　Jane had laughed at the story, half understood the conclusion. Ling heard the story at least 10 times, yet still couldn’t fully understand the mirror part. If one could only take oneself as mirror, why would Lily so scared to see her own image? Or was it because people just turn their own mirrors into searchlights when they reflect other people? Those searchlights were the most frightening nightmares for Lily as she lived on a political stage.