《On The Same Days》橄榄树

38、14th March Friday 2003 Shenyang

　　Je weet wel wat je hebt, maar niet wat je krijgt
　　(You know what you have, but not what you will get)

　　Reading through the meeting record in front of her computer before printing it out, Ling turned and rubbed her sour wrists. She should have practiced more back in college, she was simply too slow in typing, not in English, but in Chinese, she forgot those rules about how to spell a certain Chinese character with four letters. The meeting took half an hour; she spent more than an hour on typing the records. She skipped the lunch.
　　This wasn’t right; she thought she could do better. Even with translation, some building plans, she wasn’t good either, those technical terms failed her, sometimes she had no clue about those heating, cooling or piping systems even in Chinese, if she had to translate them in English for some Foreign hotel mangers she really felt at loss of words. Never before had she knew to be able to talk in English was such a different matter than to translate.
　　But translation was not the worst part; at least she got her time to check up her giant technical dictionary. Interpretation was the worst. Two days ago she had to interpret some soundproofing material and its working system, she had no idea what was it all about, she asked Lee a few times why before interpretation, Lee had got irritated at a certain point and said “You don’t have to know why, just tell him!”

　　“But I have to understand it myself to explain to others.” She had argued,
　　“Nobody expected you to be an engineer, just interpret!”
　　Ling hadn’t talked to Lee the whole day, till he had asked at the end of the day rather concerned “Are you exhausted? You looked tired.”

　　The stupid woody head man hadn’t even realized he had hurt her pride.
　　And that hadn’t been the only problem; some of the colleagues here weren’t giving her easy times, except a young engineer who was a friend of Fan. The other day she overheard the accountant, one of those old state owned senior employees talking to another back office lady, “Young girls nowadays all know how to please older man, as long as they are rich or powerful.” “Even college students play the same game, unbelievable.” Ling had been afraid of more dreadful comments, she flushed the toilet, and the sounds scared the two other ladies away.

　　Shook her head at the thought, Ling went to Lee’s office at the end of the hall with the meeting record. Lee was on the phone, as always. Instead of quietly dropping the documents on his table and went away, Ling settled herself in the chair across him.
　　“20% discount?”
　　“A new supplier? How is the quality?”
　　“We don’t need 100 thousands pieces,”
　　“All right then, if you are sure about it; check it carefully.”

　　Hang on the phone, Lee explained Ling “fireproof ceiling tiles, some new offer. What is wrong?”
　　“I think I am wrong instead of whatever else. I’m not much of a help here.”
　　“What is in your hands?”
　　“The meeting records,”
　　“We need it, haven’t you wrote it, typed it and printed it?”
　　“But it took me hours, any girl with some computer experience will be quicker than I am.”
　　“But they don’t speak English,”
　　“I wasn’t really good in interpreting either,”
　　“Oh, Ling,” Lee lean forward, took Ling’s hand, set the documents on table, “Nobody is perfect, you learn so quick already, you just started two weeks ago, if you are even better than this I might be in danger to lose my seat.”
　　Ling flushed but smiled, “I never want to achieve that much worry of yours, and I don’t want to become another worry of yours. That’s all.”

　　“I hope you will always stay as the worry of mine, not whoever else, you talked a lot with that young engineer.” Lee half joked, he couldn’t let go of the age, especially when he saw her chatting among her own age group, he felt somewhat isolated.

　　“I just tried to steal some technical terms,” with a even bigger smile, Ling was just going to tell Lee that she decided to attend some part time computer courses at weekends in Shenyang University.
　　Lee’s telephone went again.
　　“Yes, What?!” Lee abruptly stood up,
　　“Did you ask her teacher?” he frowned deeply,
　　“We are coming right away!” heavily he hung up the phone,
　　“What happened with Jane?” Ling heard the word teacher,
　　“I wish I know, she wasn’t there, she didn’t went to the driver after the lectures.”
　　Ling turned pale too, after dashed into a taxi to □□, Ling tried to think, SM building had quiet a few exits, the driver always parked outside of the main hall, and Jane knew it.
　　“Maybe she went with any other classmates to the shopping Mall?” after said it, Ling shook her own head, very unlikely, it never happened before, Jane wasn’t particularly very close to other children, lately with Ben, but…

　　Dashed in the building, the driver was eagerly talking to the puzzled peacock.
　　“Nothing happened during lectures, it all went normal, I went out for lunch after dismissed them.” Peacock told yet another time to Ling and Lee,

　　“She didn’t leave earlier? Did she behave normal? Did you saw her went out with any other students together after being dismissed?” Ling wished to catch a clue,

　　“I am sure nobody left the class earlier. She didn’t do anything abnormal, No.” peacock tried hard to think, “I am sorry I really had no idea if she went out with herself or anyone else. I was collecting my materials.”
　　“It was nearly one hour ago now,” Ling checked her watch, “I need to go up in the □□ office and call up Jane’s classmates.”
　　“Ok, we will go ask around the shopping mall.” Lee and the driver went to those stands.

　　An hour later, they met again in the hallway. 3 worried-sick faces.
　　Ling called Ben, talked to him and her mother; they said they went down stair earlier than Jane did. 14 of the rest 16 classmates were reached too, no one had any useful information, they saw her went down, but didn’t notice anything abnormal. The only child she didn’t get on line went to a swimming lesson afterwards, the family told, definitely not with Jane.

　　Nobody in the shopping mall could provide anything useful either, there were loads 5 or 6 years old girls running around in the Mall with their parents, sometimes a few steps away from their parents. The security guard of the Mall told there was indeed a little girl got lost in the Mall, but the parents came to pick up her a few minutes after they heard the broadcast. Lee asked them to broadcast for Jane as well, but, no reaction, she wasn’t in the building.

　　“Maybe we should call the police,” the driver suggested, “I am so sorry, I should came up to wait beside the classroom door…” he indeed felt so sorry, if anything happened to that little devil who kissed him recently everyday for his driving, he simply wouldn’t forgive himself.
　　“Stop blaming yourself,” Lee looked at the driver, “maybe laid off workers wanted to take revenge on me, you couldn’t help it, maybe they’d call me to blackmail.”

　　The shadow of the long haired thief with a sharp knife ran through Ling’s head, she couldn’t help but trembled, “Let’s call the police, Lee.”

　　* * *

　　In the evening, Lee’s house was full with sick-worried faces. The babysitter and Ling both got red eyes. Lee sat beside the phone with hands in his hair, the driver walked from one side of the living room to the other side. Ling’s parents kept looking out of the window down the street. No blackmail calls, no reports from the police, no clue.
　　Telephone rang, the whole room shook. Lee picked the receiver up in a flash; everyone came to stand beside him,
　　“Oh, No?”
　　“No, she haven’t contact home,”
　　“No, we haven’t receive any blackmail calls,”
　　“Thanks, thanks a lot.”
　　No one asked anything. It was obvious, the police hadn’t found her either.

　　“Come on, Look!” Ling’s father suddenly pressed his whole face on the window, Ling’s mother also shouted with disbelief “Jane!”

　　The rest of the room dashed to the window, Ling’s father tried to open it meanwhile Ling’s mother dashed to the door. Ling only caught a sight of a taxi drove away by the window then dashed downstairs.

　　There Jane was, all in one piece, dragged a big shopping bag, smiled from ear to ear at the sight of Ling’s mother,
　　“I remember my birthday is 10 days away?” she managed to ask in the deadly tight arms of Ling’s, wondering why everyone was here for her today.

　　Lee knelt down, took Jane out of Ling’s arms, held her shoulder, watched into her eyes,
　　“Where have you been the whole day? Why didn’t you come home with the driver?”

　　Jane felt her shoulder hurt, frightened under Lee’s inquisition,
　　“I went to the zoo with your secretary and she said you wanted to buy me these gifts.” Jane pulled the huge shopping bag,
　　“My secretary?” Lee was baffled, “What is her name? How could you believe a stranger? Why didn’t you call me?”

　　“Jessica, she said your driver had no time to pick me up and you told her to play with me the afternoon. She wasn’t a stranger.”
　　Everyone was fascinated, Ling deeply frowned, she had no idea that Lee had a secretary called Jessica, she never see any Jessica’s at work in the last two weeks.
　　“How does she look like?” Lee continued asking.
　　“Very, very beautiful,” Jane’s eyes shinning with admiration. Ling felt suddenly nauseas.
　　“Did she make any other appointments with you?”
　　“No, but she said you will send her to play with me some other time and you will, will you papa?” Jane asked eagerly,
　　“We will see. But from now on, you have to go to the driver immediately after the class no matter whoever asks you to go with her, ok?”
　　“Ok.” Jane unwillingly agreed under Lee’s heavy clench.

　　“Don’t scare the girl,” Ling’s mother carried Jane up and took her inside of the room. Ling opened the shopping bag, nice wrapped princess dolls in different sizes and silk dresses, Harry Porte notebooks and stationeries, Jungle Book hair accessories and even more staff.
　　She looked up at Lee with questioned marked eyes; Lee shook his head, “I never have any secretary called Jessica.”

　　After Jane went to bed, they had a whole discussion if they should go and report with the police. Then decided not to as Jane obviously wouldn’t cooperate and it seemed indeed the Jessica didn’t mean to hurt Jane. The police hadn’t even helped to find Jane back anyway.