Outrun the Moon

by Stacey Lee

  “The longer the wait, the sweeter the taste,” I tell Jack.

  He knots his mouth into a tight rosebud, and his sticky hand stops yanking so hard. The sight of his bruised knuckles where his first grade teacher tried to hit the stammer out of him squeezes my heart. Jack’s lungs and speech development were never the same after the city forcibly inoculated us against the Black Death a few years ago.

  It won’t always be this way, not if I can help it. One day, we shall have a map of the world and a chest full of pennies to throw at it.

  The baker’s wife stands in the doorway of her Number Nine Bakery, using a fan to sweep the golden smells into the street. The number nine sounds like the word for everlasting in Chinese, and it is hoped that a business with that number will have permanence.

  A frown burrows deep into her face as we pass. “Bossy cheeks,” she mutters after me. She has always disapproved of my free-spirited ways, so different than her daughter, Ling-Ling. The girl sits as still as a vase inside the shop, a basket of buns on her lap.

  I force myself not to react, herding Jack toward Montgomery Street, the main route through North Beach. Cheeks are a measure of one’s authority, and my high cheekbones indicate an assertive, ambitious nature. They were a gift from my mother, and I am proud of them, even though men shy away from women with that attribute.

  Is that why Tom has been acting so funny? We’d been as close as two walnut halves growing up, and it only seemed natural that we would end up together. At least to me.

  If I were more demure, perhaps Tom would be less ambivalent about our fortuitous match. A respected herbalist needs a proper wife, someone who doesn’t parade down uneven streets. Someone who doesn’t bribe her way into elite schools.

  I nearly collide with a water trough, scaring away thoughts of Tom.

  Jack pumps his free arm as if to propel us there faster, risking a rip in the too-tight sleeves of his jacket. The towel flaps against his thigh with every step. I pull him slower again. Ah-Suk tonified Jack’s internal energy with his five-flavor tea, but we must avoid overexertion.

  “You think they’re as good as Li’l Betties?” he asks.

  “You can get Li’l Betties on any street corner. These chocolates are special.”

  The mingled scent of garlic and ocean brine signals that North Beach lies ahead. Ba says when he was a kid, he could hawk coffin nails—what he called cigarettes—to twenty different people in the Latin Quarter and not hear the same language twice. Now the Russkies and Paddies have left for sunny Potrero Hill, the Germans have moved to Noe Valley, and les Froggies went wherever they pleased. Today, the area’s mostly Italian, with pockets of Mexicans and South Americans sewn in, each conveniently provided with their own Catholic church, just like the Chinese.

  The avenue grows dense with Italians hurrying in and out of shops. Some avert their gaze as we pass, while others make no effort to conceal their distaste for our being there.

  Jack squeezes my hand. “The paving stones are newer here. Maybe they’re afraid we’ll track dirt through, and that’s why they’re ngok.” He uses the Chinese word for “hot-tempered.”

  “We have the same dirt under our shoes as they do.” We pass through this neighborhood every once in a while to fly kites on the shoreline, and the inhabitants are never happy to see us.

  “Are we mad when they use our streets?” he asks.

  “Sometimes.” He pans his thin face at me, waiting for an explanation. But how do I explain that to white ghosts, we are animals, which is why they’ve caged us in twelve rickety blocks. We are something to be ogled, lower even than black ghosts. I once read in a brochure that whites could purchase a “heathen experience” in our “labyrinthine passages,” including a trip to an idol-filled joss house, a peek into a real opium den (including a suck on a savage’s pipe for the more adventurous), and a nibble on pig’s feet (as if we ate those every day).

  I sigh. “We’re more mad that they’re mad when we use their streets.”

  People openly stare at us, even in our western clothes. Ba says that since we were born in Oakland, we are American, and he doesn’t want Jack to wear the queue in his hair since it is unpatriotic. Whites consider the tradition barbaric, but I don’t see how it’s any worse than stuffing horsehair pads into one’s hair to achieve the Edwardian poof.

  I realize I’m now pulling Jack and force myself to slow our pace again.

  Ahead, a woman with an enormous hat attends to her produce stand. Checking for traffic, I guide Jack across the street to avoid any accusation of stealing. We reach the other side, where a trio of Italian men hunch on crates beneath the red awning of Luciana’s, the swankiest restaurant on this street. A young man with teeth like yellow corn flicks the ash off his cigarette and leers.

  I consider crossing back to the opposite side—Mercy the Fearsome is not stupid—but if I let the Italian cow me, I show him and anyone watching that we can be pushed around like the dogs they think us to be.

  I attempt to sail by like I have not a care in the world.

  But as we pass, the man unfolds himself and peanut shells waterfall off his dungarees. He towers over me by a head. “Pigtail Alley’s that way.” He stabs a tobacco-stained finger toward Chinatown.

  “Excuse us. You’re blocking the footpath,” I say evenly.

  With a laugh that smells like wine, he glances at the two other men peeling carrots behind him. “Whadyaknow, she speaks English.”

  Wouldn’t I like to show him how much English I speak.

  Jack tugs at my hand, and I squeeze his palm reassuringly. When life puts a stone in your path, it is best to walk around it.

  I pull Jack into the street. We pass the hooligan, but as we regain the curb, I feel my straw bonnet being lifted off my head. The man places it on his greasy locks, presses his hands together, and bows. “No walkee on street without paying ching-chong toll.”

  My cheeks flame, and I can feel the button about to pop off my collar. I attempt to snatch back my hat, but he holds it out of reach. “Pay the toll—a dollar for you and the bambino—and maybe I’ll give you your hat back.”

  “I will not, even if I did have a dirty dollar to throw at swine like you.”

  “Oh ho, she’s got some pepper in her sauce, eh, cugino?” He glances again at his friends, who are now grinning. Through the window, a young woman with mahogany curls moves about the restaurant placing snowball-shaped votives onto the tables.

  “G-g-give,” says Jack. His fists clench, and his chest begins to move as quick as a bird’s. “G-g-give it—”

  “It’s okay, Jack,” I tell him in Cantonese.

  The man laughs. “Whatsa matter? Your mouth don’t work, bambino? Or maybe he’s some kind of idiota.” He taps his head.

  It is all I can do to keep from clouting him in the mouth. His gaze washes over my figure like dirty bathwater, coming to rest on the pocket where I have the chuen pooi bulb stashed in a handkerchief. A corner of the white fabric peeks out in stark contrast to the black of my funeral dress.

  I jerk away, but he snatches the bundle from my pocket. “I found my toll.” The man discards my hat onto a newspaper full of carrot peelings. Jack fetches it, his face pale.

  The man unties the handkerchief, but doesn’t find the coins he’s looking for. He holds the shriveled bulb to his nose, then quickly pulls it away. Chuen pooi smells like ripe feet. “Che cavolo! What is it?”

  One of his friends peers at the herb, then shrugs. “Looks like cogliones.”

  The first man snorts loudly, but then his derision gives way to uncertainty. Aha.

  “It is the energy pouch of a farmer who tried to pass off a guinea hen as a chicken.” The words are out of my mouth before I know what I’m saying. “Chinese people have many ways to make those who cross us pay.” I draw myself up as tall as I can and summon my haughtiest demeanor. “Lucky for him, he’d
already had five sons and didn’t need it anymore.”

  The man blanches from under a grove of black whiskers. At that moment, the mahogany-haired waitress pokes her head out the door. She glares at the men through her almond “dragon” eyes, a shape that indicates determination. “How long does a smoke take?”

  I seize the moment and pluck my belongings from his grasp. Clamping my hat back onto my head, I sweep Jack away, hoping they don’t follow.

  By the time we arrive at Chocolatier Du Lac, I’ve developed a crick in my neck from looking backward and am ready to throw my boots into the nearest trash receptacle. But to give up now would be a waste of several good blisters, so I resolve to ignore the pain a little while longer.

  The shop occupies one corner of the manufacturing plant, a brick structure that spans the whole block. A bay window provides a view of perfect rounds of chocolate arrayed neatly on cake stands. Jack stares at the bounty without blinking. Each morsel looks to be dressed for Easter Mass with sugar bows, flowers, and little polka dots. Bet they charge a sweet premium for those bitty flourishes.

  “This is the best thing I’ve ever seen,” says Jack, practically drooling.

  “Come on, then.”

  The smell of burned sugar assaults us as I open the door. At our entry, Madame Du Lac looks up from behind the counter, and her small mouth seems to recede deeper into her face.

  I knew it wasn’t going to be easy, and yet her instant dislike puts straw down my back.

  The fleshy customer she is with stops jabbering to frown at us, then continues her monologue at a reduced volume. Too bad the marble floors amplify sound.

  “Used to cost two dollars to wash ’em. Now she wants three—I’ll take five nougats, and four more honeys—and to pile on the agony, she wants a carriage to pick her up. South of the Slot, too! Do I look like I’m swimming in gold?—no need for the ribbon; save yourself the trouble—How are we supposed to eat paying that?”

  Jack tugs my dress, and I bend so that our faces are even. “Choose the one you want, but don’t touch anything.”

  With a solemn nod, he stuffs his hands in his pockets as if he doesn’t trust them. He wanders around the room, peering into the glass cases and up at the shelves.

  Madame Du Lac passes a look to a girl, who couldn’t be older than me, working so quietly behind the counter that I didn’t notice her at first. Perfect ears like pink seashells hold back blond plaits that cascade down her starched apron. Her violet eyes are as insolent as the cow I found chewing up the Garden of Purity at the cemetery. She goes to stand by Jack, probably to make sure he doesn’t pinch anything.

  My toes curl. Even the shopgirls outrank us.

  Finally, the fleshy customer leaves in a cloud of perfume. Madame Du Lac points her chin in my direction and says in an arctic voice, “We are closing.”

  Jack crooks his finger at a chocolate that looks like a domino. The shopgirl languidly produces tongs from her apron.

  “Just a minute, Elodie,” says Madame Du Lac. “That will be twenty cents,” she says to me.

  Twenty cents? I could buy twenty Li’l Betties for that.

  A smile creeps up the girl’s face when she sees my expression, and I’m tempted to smack it off her.

  “Which ones cost five cents?” I ask stiffly.

  Madame Du Lac points to a dish of chocolate-covered peanuts on the counter. “You may get two cacahouètes.”

  Caca-what? Even the peanuts here are pretentious.

  Jack, bless his sweet face, doesn’t let his disappointment show but creeps to the counter and tentatively holds out his hand. When the woman makes no move to dispense the treats, I realize she’s waiting for me to pay. I begin to cook from the inside out and remind myself that The Book for Business-Minded Women says one must remain unsinkable in the face of adversity, like a cork in a barrel of water.

  I step to the counter and plunk down my nickel. Thanks to the shoes, I have a good three inches on the shop owner. She squints at the coin without picking it up. Maybe she thinks it’s stolen, or that it will give her the bubonic plague.

  After another moment’s hesitation, she scoops it up to deposit into her brass register. I gloat. We are not so different after all, you stale old pastry. You might have more lace around your collar, but deep in our basements, we both speak the language of cold hard cash.

  Holding an abalone spoon high, as if afraid Jack will contaminate it, Madame Du Lac deposits two minuscule nuts onto his palm. The nuggets nearly drop, but he snatches his fist closed. He offers one to me, but I shake my head, forcing a smile. I want to take those peanuts and stick them up her nose.

  For a moment, the only sound is the crunching in Jack’s mouth.

  I clear my throat, trying to remember the words I prepared and the reason I stuffed my feet into these blasted cages of torture. “Madame, my name is Mercy Wong. I wondered if I might speak to your husband about a matter of personal importance.”

  Her eyes ice over. “What matter could someone like you have with my husband?”

  “St. Clare’s School for Girls. I am most interested in becoming a student, and as your husband is president of the board”—which I learned after requesting a brochure under a false name—“I was hoping to—”

  “You?” She looks me up and down.

  I wonder which part she objects to most: the slant of my eyes, the look of the only dress I own, or the cast of my “bilious” skin, as some have called it.

  “St. Clare’s does not take riffraff. They have standards.” Her eyes flick to my calloused hands resting on the counter, and I snatch them away. The shopgirl, Elodie, returns to her chair but keeps an eye on me.

  I remind myself to be unsinkable. “I can do the work. I graduated from the Oriental Public School with the highest marks.”

  “Impossible,” Madame Du Lac pronounces in French. “It is time for you to leave.”

  Jack looks to me for guidance.

  I strain to keep my emotions in check and produce the small bundle from my pocket. “It’s a pity”—I untie the handkerchief, letting the corners drop open just enough to give her a peek at the chuen pooi bulb inside—“after bringing this all the way here.”

  The woman’s crinkled lids peel back, and she draws in a breath. “Is that—?”

  “Yes, it is. A nice chunk like this is hard to come by.” I owe Tom at least a year’s worth of haircuts for this.

  Her carriage loosens like parchment unrolling. She glances uneasily toward the shopgirl, who has given up the pretense of writing. “Elodie, leave us, s’il te plaît.”

  Elodie peaks an eyebrow, then sets down her quill and exits through a back door.

  Despite the gray streaking her mostly blond hair and the wrinkles around her mouth, Madame is still a daisy, with delicate cheekbones and the kind of slender neck that was made for a pearl choker. Most women who seek chuen pooi already possess more than their share of beauty, a gift that becomes a crutch to them in later years.

  Used primarily for coughs, chuen pooi is also known to fade freckles and lighten the complexion. Madame Du Lac twice asked Tom’s father to sell her some, but he refused. It is against his principles to sell the expensive herb for vanity’s sake. According to Tom, Madame even faked a cough.

  “How do I know that’s the real thing?” she says regally, her aquiline nose flaring.

  “You don’t. Let’s go, Jack.” I pocket the chuen pooi and pull him to the door. It is an act, but one I take great pleasure in delivering. We have suffered too much insult not to milk this moment for all the cream.

  Before I touch the door handle, Madame says, “Arrêtez.”

  I exhale a pretend sigh and crook my ear in her direction without turning around.

  “Perhaps there is room for a discussion.”

  Not good enough by a mile. I clasp the brass knob. Her shoes clack toward us.
>
  She favors one side when she walks, the way people do when they are nursing an injury. “Surely you can’t expect my husband to admit you just like that.”

  “No. All I ask is for a meeting to introduce myself.”

  As I peer down at her, she crosses her arms and bristles. “He will be at the school Monday at noon. I shall tell him to expect you.”

  I begin to leave, but she clears her throat loudly. “The herb, please. You will understand if I do not trust you.”

  Smiling, I pluck the bulb from my handkerchief and drop it into her waiting hand.

  She colors when she sees the full glory of its suggestive shape. “But how do I make a preparation?”

  “I will give instructions to your husband on Monday. You will understand if I do not trust you.”

  Creases form around her mouth. She casts a dark look at Jack, as if he must be to blame. For that, I needle her further. “And my brother really wanted this one.” I cross to the plate with the domino bonbon and lift off the glass lid. “You don’t mind, do you?”

  Madame Du Lac’s bony chest pigeons, probably filling her lungs for a good spouting off. But then she nods, lips pursed tight.

  I’m about to pick out the nicest one with my bare fingers when Jack says, “N-n-no, thank you.” He tugs at his collar. “They’re not as good as Li’l Betties.”

  Madame turns as red as a strawberry. I do not laugh, though the effort gives me a stitch in the side. Replacing the lid, I chirp, “Good day, Madame.”

  Mrs. Lowry says a good businesswoman should always leave with a smile, even when her company looks fit to spit.

  3

  JACK’S LUNGS GROW WHEEZY ON THE return trek, and I lift him onto my back.

  “I want to walk,” he gasps.

  “One day, I’ll be an old woman, and I’ll need you to carry me. I’m paying my debts in advance.”

  When Jack was barely three and I was twelve, I overheard Ma say that Jack’s life would be short. That was the only time I’d ever seen Ba almost cuff her. “Never speak of such nonsense again,” he roared before storming out of our flat.