Massage

by Bi Feiyu

  He finally appeared before her eyes, fuzzy and blurry, just an outline, but she was sure it was a solid object, about five foot six inches tall. Jin Yan was different from other sightless people in that she was not completely blind; she could see but not clearly. Her eyesight had been ruined ten years earlier by maculopathy, a sinister disease that damaged the eyesight little by little, gradually reducing the field of vision till there was nothing left. Her remaining sight was restricted to the area directly before her eyes, with the limited view of a few millimetres. She could see herself in the mirror if she pressed her nose against it. Or, put differently, if she pulled his face all the way up to hers and tried hard, she could see what he looked like. But she didn’t care about his appearance; compared to his undying love, his looks meant nothing to her.

  His fingers fell on her, at last, first on the neck to help her relax. His bony hands had strength, but the joints felt loose, a perfect match for his weak and passive nature. From the spread and force of his movements, he appeared not to be a confident man, but a cautious, even submissive, one. He would not cut corners. With his gentle hands, he worked on every acupoint; on sensitive areas, he was especially considerate, imagining the experience from a client’s perspective. And he was left-handed.

  The old man upstairs was smiling down on her. From the moment she’d heard Xu Tailai’s story, she knew what kind of man he was; as if guided by an oracle, she knew everything about a man she had never met. And now it seemed so real. He was the kind of man she wanted; he was her type. Jin Yan did not care for domineering men, for they seek to conquer the world, holding women in their arms like timid little birds. That was not what she wanted, not her ideal man. For her, the most important trait in a man was gentleness, and, even better, a bit of sentimentality. Then she could be like an older sister, or perhaps even a mother, to protect and guide him. Jin Yan was fixated on a romance characterised by indulgence; she would indulge and spoil her man to such a dizzying extent that he would be unable to tear himself away from her. She’d had a brief romance before with a young man who could see better than she. In the end his pathetically limited eyesight was his downfall, for he had too high an opinion of himself and acted like an overlord around her. They had kissed, but only once before she firmly refused to see him again. His kiss repelled her; it was self-centred and aggressive, a kiss that would swallow her up. What she longed for was to hold her beloved in her arms and slowly, little by little, gobble him up. Jin Yan knew herself well; her kind of love was abstract and yet expansive, sweeping and engulfing. Like a tigress, she preferred a submissive, obedient, even henpecked man, who was tender and clingy. She cared more about loving than being loved; in fact, she cared only about loving someone.

  Jin Yan’s eye problems had begun when she was ten, and her life between the ages of ten and seventeen were spent seeing doctors. Eight years of doctors’ visits boiled down to the fact that her ailment kept getting more serious and her eyesight kept getting worse; nothing would change that. In the end, she managed to convince her parents not to visit any more doctors. Losing one’s sight is painful beyond description, but in her case it was different. She had gone through the process of gradual loss, little by little, and was able to prepare herself mentally for the inevitable result. At seventeen, an age of abundance and vitality for a girl, Jin Yan gave up therapy and resolved to pack as much brilliance into her life as time would allow. She began to squander her sight, seizing her last chance to read, to attend plays, to go to movies, to watch TV and to view films on DVD. From reading and viewing, she developed a focus, a theme – romantic love as portrayed in fiction and film. It was wonderful, poignant, complicated and dramatic, devoid of any concern for daily necessities such as food and clothing, firewood, rice, cooking oil, salt, soy sauce, vinegar and tea, and yes, even medicine. It was fascinating; so what if it was someone else’s romance. What was so bad about observing it in books and on the screen? Gradually, she found a new thread, realising that love was only the beginning, a foundation for what pleased her the most – weddings. She loved the weddings in novels and movies, especially the movies. She had lost count of the movie weddings she’d seen, ancient and modern, Chinese and foreign. Soon a pattern was revealed to her: all comedies ended in weddings and all tragedies in deaths. Weddings and deaths, these were everything life had to offer. So no talk about politics, economics, military or foreign affairs, personality, fate, culture, the nation, the times, customs, happiness, sadness, food, clothes – retro or trendy. No need to be so arcane. Just watch a wedding and you’ll see everything you need.

  A girl with a unique mentality, Jin Yan knew she had to concentrate on more important matters, since she would eventually be blind; the old man upstairs would not give her many opportunities. What else could she do but try to keep from dying of hunger or cold? Only find love. Her love had yet to arrive. She told herself she could live without anything but love, and she would embellish her love with the best she had to offer. How would she do that? She’d have a wonderful romance, and follow that with the grandest of all events – a wedding. In a way, once she gave up treatments, she devoted every day of her life to weddings, inserting herself into novels, movies and TV dramas; she kept getting married, sometimes in the northeast, at other times in the southwest, in China or other countries, in ancient times or present day. This was her secret, and she never felt ashamed; instead, weddings were what supported her, gave her proteins, vitamins, wind, rain, sunlight and snow. Of course, along with happiness, she had worries. Her biggest concern was losing her eyesight before her wedding; she must marry herself off before that happened, no matter what. She’d record the ceremony and, if she was lucky, watch the video every day, even if that required her to sprawl atop the TV screen, until she could no longer see a thing. What was the saying people used? You can wear your eyes out gazing eagerly.

  There was another saying: gaze with eager anticipation. She still remembered what her eyes were like. Before the onset of the disease, her eyes were clear and bright, with a little ripple and a slight wobble. With slightly upturned corners, those eyes were as pretty as autumn waters. Sometimes she even congratulated herself on her poor eyesight, for otherwise, her eyes would really know how to flirt. Who knows what might happen then?

  As she lay on the bed and felt Tailai’s fingers on her back, she sighed softly. It was like a dream, but she stubbornly told herself it was not a dream. It was real. Over and over she warned herself to keep at it, not let go. This is not a dream. It’s real. She longed to turn over and grab his hands, telling him, We’ve been in love for a long time, did you know that?

  ‘Not so hard,’ she said.

  ‘Softer,’ she said.

  ‘Can’t you take a little pressure?’ Tailai said. It was the first thing he’d ever said to her. ‘Any softer and it won’t do any good.’

  How could that be? Once tuina softens to a certain point, it’s no longer tuina, it’s a back rub. Men don’t know things like that. With an all but silent snort, she said, ‘May I ask your name, Sir?’

  ‘No need to be so formal,’ he said. ‘My family name is Xu.’

  ‘Ah,’ she said. With her face buried in the cradle, her heart came alive. ‘If you’ll tell me how many siblings you have, I can guess your given name. Believe me?’

  He let go of one hand and considered her offer. ‘What do you do for a living?’

  ‘I’m a student of fate logic.’

  ‘Like fortune telling?’

  ‘No. Everything has its logic, like the Tao has its logic, as do mathematics and physics.’

  ‘So, tell me, how many siblings do I have?’

  ‘You’ll have to tell me your name. Then I’ll know how many siblings you have.’

  He thought about it and said, ‘Why not tell me my name? I have one young sister.’

  So he was indeed from northern Jiangsu, with that thick accent. Only people from northern Jiangsu pronounce the word ‘sister’ as ‘thister’. He’d said he had one thister.
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  It took her a while to say, ‘Your surname is Xu, right? And one sister, am I right? Then your name is Xu-Tai-lai. Yes, you are Xu Tailai.’

  He stopped working. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘I’m a student of fate logic.’

  ‘How did you know my name?’

  ‘As I said, everything has its logic. Your surname is Xu and you have one sister so you can only be Xu Tailai.’

  ‘Why should I believe you?’

  ‘I don’t want you to believe me. I just want you to believe that you are Xu Tailai. Do you believe that?’

  He paused and said nothing for a long while. ‘What else do you know?’

  Jin Yan sat up. There was about her the aura of a sorceress, but she was comfortable in the knowledge that her aura was one of cheerfulness. ‘Let me see your hands,’ she said.

  In line with the convention – men to the left, women to the right – he offered his left hand, but she took both his hands in hers. This was her first contact with him and it made her sad, but just for a moment. Driving out that feeling, she felt his palms, then the backs of his hands, before stopping and saying with calm assurance, ‘You are destined to have two women in your life.’

  ‘Why two?’

  ‘Because you can’t have the first one.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘It’s your fate. You do not belong to her.’

  She sensed a spasm run through his body. Either he was trembling or the air was stirring.

  ‘Why can’t she be my woman?’

  ‘Because you belong to the second woman.’

  ‘What if I don’t love her?’

  ‘That’s the problem,’ she said as she dropped his hands. ‘You do love her.’

  He raised his head, his eyes to the sky, the universe above, standing in the middle of the boundless universe as empyrean winds swirled around him.

  Jin Yan decided it was time to stop toying with him. ‘Would you do me a favour and ask your boss over?’

  He froze, wondering what suddenly was happening in his life. Of course, she was not to be believed, but the blind are superstitious, at least to some degree, and are, by nature, fatalists. Fate cannot be seen, and the blind cannot see, so they feel a particular affinity with fate. Xu called Sha Fuming in, naively thinking that the client was going to lodge a complaint. Sha rushed in, but he knew the moment he walked in that she was not going to complain; she wanted a job.

  Taking the initiative, turning from client into boss, Jin Yan asked Sha to lie down, transforming the room into a job interview site. She was about to start a demonstration on him but Sha, a seasoned owner, refused to follow her instructions.

  ‘This is a small place,’ Sha turned her down. ‘We don’t need anyone now.’

  ‘Impossible,’ she said. ‘Every place needs outstanding workers.’

  Jin Yan tugged on Sha Fuming’s arm to have him lie down, a new experience for him. But since he did not want to start a scuffle, he had no choice but to do as she wanted. It took only two minutes for him to know that she wasn’t bad, with plenty of strength in her hands. But she was not as good as she’d claimed, and certainly nowhere near outstanding.

  He coughed and sat up, adopting a pleasant tone, and said, ‘This is a small place, a little temple, you see. Now if you follow Reform Road and walk four kilometres, you’ll reach another tuina centre at the intersection of Reform and Open-up Roads. You can try your luck there.’ To soften the tone, he even tried to be funny. ‘Apparently, when it comes to reform and opening up, there are only tuina and massage along the way.’

  She didn’t laugh. Instead she said, ‘I’m not going anywhere. I’m staying here.’

  How unreasonable was that! Sha had never seen a jobseeker like her, but he laughed. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I’m not here to work. I’d have gone someplace else if that’s what I had in mind.’

  Sha laughed again. ‘But we don’t need a boss here either.’

  ‘I just like your management style. I want to study that here.’

  Equally unreasonable, but well said, to Sha’s delight. Her comment loosened him up, like a muscle rub. He stopped smiling, his lips twitching a couple of times before he continued, ‘Where’d you hear that?’

  ‘Shanghai.’ An evasive answer that said nothing; no specific mention of anyone, it brought all of Shanghai into play. That is to say, all of Shanghai was aware of Sha Fuming’s management style. This throwaway comment was no longer a muscle rub; rather, it went straight to Sha’s metaphorical acupoint, bringing him tremendous satisfaction. The more pleased he was, the less appropriate it was to show it. With the modesty and decorum befitting a successful businessman, he said in an offhanded way, ‘We’re just learning as we go. It’s nothing special.’

  ‘What I want is to study your management style and open my own place some day. If you’re worried, I’ll promise you here and now that if I open a tuina centre in Nanjing, I’ll make sure it’s ten kilometres from here. My repayment for your kindness.’

  It may have sounded as if she cared about repaying his kindness, but it was more like a challenge, one that he had to accept. People are like that most of the time; their strength is often their weakness. He laughed again and cleared his throat. ‘We’re all blind here, so let’s not talk about that. If you make a living, I do too. The Sha Zongqi tuina centre welcomes you.’

  After thanking him, Jin Yan began to feel apprehensive. There had been no news of Xu Tailai for the longest time, during which she had kept faith with this one-sided romance, boldly moving forwards on a tightrope, fearlessly, calmly, bravely and patiently. Now she’d finally walked up to him. A tightrope walker must never look down, but she did, and she was scared witless – every step had been fraught with the danger of falling. A sudden wave of sadness surged almost uncontrollably through her heart, but she didn’t cry, for she realised that love means hardship and suffering, but even more it is a soulstirring experience. This was real love. Jin Yan had fallen in love with her own love.

  The problem was, Tailai was completely unaware of all this; he knew nothing about her love for him. Turning a one-sided romance into a relationship of two was not going to be easy. One thing was clear, though: he had yet to recover from his first setback. But so what, even if he had? How could he know what was on her mind? And what could he say if he did?

  She had no intention of dragging things out. After much consideration, she decided to start with language. Nanjing may be close to northern Jiangsu, yet his accent was unmistakable. He was too concerned about his accent, which in turn had caused low self-esteem. They would never be able to communicate freely if she didn’t help him overcome this linguistic challenge.

  An opportunity finally presented itself. At last she had a moment alone with him, in the lounge. She knew it wouldn’t last long, five minutes at the most, maybe only two.

  There was one sticking point: Tailai was afraid of her. He had been fearful of her since their first encounter, the moment she offered to read his fortune. Fully aware of that, she refrained from chatting him up right away. Instead, she took out her mobile phone and pretended to make a call to her family in Dalian. No one picked up. She sighed and shut the phone.

  ‘Your home isn’t far from Nanjing, is it Tailai?’

  ‘Not far at all,’ he said, ‘just under three hundred kilometres.’

  ‘Is that all?’ She sounded puzzled. ‘How can that be?’ she continued slowly. ‘The Nanjing dialect grates on the ear. Your hometown is less than three hundred kilometres from here, and yet it has such a charming sound. It’s wonderful.’

  Her comment was like a bomb, a depth charge, drifting in the fluids of his heart, settling deeper and deeper. He could feel it sinking but was powerless to do anything about it. Then he heard a muffled sound. The charge had exploded, turning the fluids into a giant column of water that soared and boiled, rising up in a frenzy and then crashing down in similar fashion. No one could possibly describe the surging waves and roiling tides in his heart,
but she heard that he had begun to breathe hard.

  As he sat there in a daze, she started to walk away.

  ‘I just know there must be plenty of people who love to hear you talk. I couldn’t be the only one.’

  It had a deflated sound, hinting at an awareness that she didn’t measure up. There was also a hint of self-pity, with lingering and profound implications.

  Chapter Seven

  Sha Fuming

  WHAT IS BEAUTY? What exactly is it? That question troubled Sha Fuming from the moment the director and his film crew left. He racked his brain trying to come up with an answer, only to grow increasingly confused. What is beauty and where is it located?

  To be precise, what he wanted to figure out was Du Hong, not beauty per se. But beauty claimed a place on Du Hong the person, which told him that she and beauty were one and the same. If you can’t figure out what beauty is, you’ll never really understand Du Hong. He was restless, stressed. Nothing came of his anxiety, except for more confusion and, of course, more profound darkness, a world he could never reach. Let your hands roam over her body. The very thought frightened Sha Fuming. What would his hands tell him anyway? A hand can tell size, length, firmness, temperature, dryness and shape, but it has its limitations, and with that thought he sank into despair. He spent the rest of that day absorbed in his own thoughts, sitting in the lounge. His stomach ached and his face wore a grave expression.

  In the book, beauty is described as lofty. What is lofty?

  In the book, beauty is described as graceful and refined. What is that?

  In the book, beauty is described as harmonious? How so?

  What is noble simplicity? What is serene greatness? What does imposing mean? What does grandeur signify? What does vast and boundless suggest? What is solemnity? How about sparkling crystal? What is pure and fresh? What does exquisite mean? Or mysterious? What is a rippling water surface? A misty mountain? A raging fire? Verdant greenery? An emerald island with profuse vegetation? White misty fog? Blanketing yellow sand? Vast greenery? What does it mean to be charming? Fetching? Gentle? Coquettish? Alluringly graceful? An enchanting smile? Handsome? Cool? Carefree and expansive? Mannerly? Sonorously unrestrained? Comfortably free? Why does flowing water murmur? Why do misty waves undulate? Why do heavenly roads twist and turn? Why are wavering lights lustrous? Why are soldiers and horses in a hurry? What does it mean to be a smooth operator? Why is emptiness illusory? What does it mean to have an eventful life?