Northern Girls: Life Goes On

by Sheng Keyi

  Finally, Weimei turned from the mirror, scrunched up her cheeks in a big grin and said, ‘Don’t be angry, sir. She’s new. How many rooms do you need?’

  ‘One.’

  ‘You can register here.’

  ‘I don’t wanna mess with the hassle of registering. Here’s my ID card. You fill in the forms for me.’

  Weimei took the ID card and the registration forms and pushed them across to Xiaohong.

  ‘Excuse me, sir, how many nights will you be staying?’ Xiaohong asked.

  ‘How long you think I wanna stay here? A short while will do. I don’t wanna talk to you.’ He turned to Weimei and said, ‘I’ll take an hour.’

  ‘For an hour, it’s the same price as the half-day rate,’ she replied. ‘That’ll be a two hundred yuan deposit.’

  The man pulled out a bulging wallet, dropped the notes onto the counter, took his completed registration slip and turned to walk off. He shoved his wallet into his back pocket, creating a large, round lump.

  Weimei’s straight hair covered half her face. Xiaohong looked into the mirror at the reflected image and saw two yellow specks fly out from between the other girl’s fingers and stick to its surface. A bright red spot of blood appeared on the reflection. Weimei took a tissue and dabbed at the bleeding spot, then scrunched up her face at Xiaohong, as if sharing the credit for her victory over the pimple. The warmth of the smile caught Xiaohong by surprise. Her chest heaved, a fitting response to the rare smile on Weimei’s face.

  ‘Your face is so clean. I have a problem with my glands.’ Weimei sought a suitable explanation for her chronic acne.

  ‘You shouldn’t pick them.’

  She’d never had a problem with acne herself, and so was a little uncertain about how to handle it. All the same, she continued, ‘From what I know, there is one way. Get the used bubble wrap from Visitation One birth control pills. Fill it with water then apply the water to your face. That’ll take care of all your spots.’

  Weimei felt a shock run up the length of her body. Clearly she had all her feelers out, searching for any way to get rid of her acne. Those little spots had been a big source of trouble in her life. She quickly picked up a pen, asking, ‘What’s that? What’s that? Say it again and I’ll write it down.’

  ‘Visitation One.’ Xiaohong repeated the secret remedy.

  ‘Visitation One. Sounds like the name of a satellite.’ Weimei scribbled busily, her mousy eyes scanning the page as she wrote.

  Now that they had begun to get a general feel for one another, Weimei really warmed to Xiaohong. A short while later, the curt Cantonese man came to check out, the fire in him now visibly cooled. He even tried to be nice to Xiaohong, using funny, broken Mandarin. His young companion walked into the lobby as if she had simply made a quick trip to the ladies’ room. It was as if nothing had happened. She went out of the door, turned right and disappeared. When the man turned, Xiaohong stared at his back pocket, noticing that the bulge of his wallet was substantially smaller now.

  VI

  Xiaohong felt one could get bored with this sort of work, as it involved little beyond registration procedures and note-taking, reviewing ID cards and filling in public security forms. The more pleasant duties involved the cheerful, energetic work of flirting with customers. One of the perks was observing the men and women who came into the hotel and then passing on juicy tales about their private business.

  Xiaohong enjoyed her job. Of course, she made sure to maintain a professional smile, even when she was in a mood more fit for smashing everything in sight, remembering what had happened to her first month’s salary at the factory. To put it plainly, she felt that the job was to sell smiles. And, garbed in her professional wear, at least she could sell them with some dignity.

  As the Spring Festival holiday approached, hotel discipline was relaxed. With people all over the country scattering back to their home-towns, only a few remained behind, stuck here where they endured the boredom.

  But Weimei didn’t have time to be bored. Having gotten rid of her spots, she would now search through her hair, seeking out split ends, teasing each one out and snipping it off, one at a time.

  With Weimei’s narcissistic preoccupations, naturally it was pretty boring to work with her. Xiaohong preferred to work on the desk with Ah Xing or Wu Ying. Ah Xing had a pleasant personality, and Wu Ying a well-developed sense of humour. The most important thing was that each had a congenial temperament. It was a nice change, like running in the sun over fields of grass.

  But even as she was busy making new friends, she didn’t forget the old. Sijiang’s situation troubled her. She covered half a shift for Weimei in order to arrange a full day off for herself. She got ready to go with Sijiang to the hospital to get rid of the ‘Happy Bastard’, as Sijiang called it. Sijiang’s look and her walk seemed like that of a woman in the final month of her pregnancy, ready to give birth at any time. Her face no longer looked like a fresh, juicy apple. Not only had the circle of her face shrunk, but the skin was drying up as well. The Happy Bastard simply caused too much physical trouble and was not worth the torment Sijiang was enduring.

  Xiaohong knew the psychological pressure was too much for Sijiang. A length of meat and a pair of steel pincers entering the body were two entirely different things and the horror Sijiang felt of the forceps was something for which Xiaohong had complete sympathy. As they walked to the hospital, she kept saying, ‘Sijiang, it’s nothing. In a few minutes, it’s done, just like that.’

  Sijiang felt shackled with a heavy burden, like some heroic martyr marching forward. Her eyes were now pools of deep water, like those of a soap opera character losing her child. The look of desperation made her pale and hollow. Her hastily combed hair, carelessly tied, blew in the breeze, it was like reeds blown recklessly in the chill wind.

  ‘Just a few minutes? In a few minutes, a life can be born, and in just a few bloody minutes a life can end,’ Sijiang murmured.

  Xiaohong hesitated. Sijiang went on, ‘No. Let’s go home. I don’t want to go to the hospital. It’s a life, my little cub.’ She stroked her belly, stopping in her tracks. Amidst the hustle and bustle of the passing cars, she spoke softly but Xiaohong heard every word.

  ‘You’re going to have it?’ Xiaohong asked severely.

  ‘I… I thought…’ Sijiang just nodded, a light flashing in her eyes, then fading again.

  ‘Fuck! Sijiang, now is not the time to be maternal. If you give birth to this wild creature, it’s all over for you. You’ll be ruined! And anyway – look… just look!’ Xiaohong pointed to a beggar woman sitting under a bridge holding a child. ‘Is that mother great? The child is begging! She just created another life to suffer slowly with her. If she loved that child, she would have destroyed it more quickly!’

  Sijiang was shaking. Her small eyes widened, growing brighter. She bit her lower lip with her upper teeth, as if she could bite the answer out from her own flesh.

  VII

  While Sijiang’s answer was still hanging somewhere between her upper teeth and lower lip, they arrived at the entrance to the People’s Hospital. The huge red cross drawn on the hospital’s white wall was as shocking as the effect of fresh red blood splattered across a white sheet.

  Xiaohong practically dragged Sijiang through the hospital door. It was filled with a smell so pungent it could make a healthy person ill.

  Sijiang was like an insect without its head, still scurrying along. Her eyes filled with tears. She seemed like some farm animal being led into the slaughterhouse, vaguely aware of some impending disaster, but unable to resist it. Xiaohong took a number and led Sijiang to the second floor obstetrics and gynaecology ward. Overwhelmed, they joined a long queue in the ward. Sijiang gave Xiaohong a bewildered glance, as if she were a lone figure searching for a familiar face amongst the revolutionary ranks. Finding it, her heart was warmed, and her confidence bolstered. She tugged on Xiaohong’s sleeve and whispered, ‘What do you think they’re all here for?’

&nbs
p; Xiaohong scanned the crowd. They were all young women in uniform, the name of their factories embroidered on the chest. Some waited alone quietly, others sat with a companion from work, talking softly. Occasionally, one of them looked indifferently at Xiaohong and Sijiang, her face fixed in a gloating expression. Xiaohong nodded and said, ‘Looks like they’re all like us, so you don’t need to worry.’

  After helping Sijiang fill in her medical history, the pair found a place to sit. Then Xiaohong smiled and said, ‘Hey Sijiang, how many unborn babies you think have been flushed down the hospital’s drains and out into the sea?’

  Sijiang, with a wooden smile, said, ‘Must be nice being a man. Damn them, they don’t have to take responsibility for anything!’ In her hatred towards Bud, she hated the whole species of which he was a part. He hadn’t even come with her to the hospital.

  ‘No kidding. Oh yeah, Sijiang, how much money did Bud give you for your hospital fees?’ Sijiang’s complaint reminded her to ask about this point.

  ‘Five hundred. He said to take care of the problem first then go home to recover.’

  ‘Fuck him! He really is stingy. I ought to let the little tosser come and see for himself the trouble he’s caused. You got to be thicker-skinned and demand more than just five hundred from him. What a bloody cheapskate!’

  ‘Ah Hong, what right do I have to say anything? It’s not like he hurt me on purpose.’

  ‘Don’t be a fool. Of course you have a right. He did this to you. He knocked you up and he doesn’t even plan to marry you!’

  ‘H-he… he didn’t mean to. He cares about me.’

  ‘Like hell he does. He cares enough to spice things up in bed with you. Care? That’s just what people say when they want to coax you into doing something. If he really cared, he’d give you five thousand!’ Xiaohong hissed angrily.

  Sijiang glanced around, embarrassed. ‘Ah Hong, keep it down.’

  ‘Sijiang, this is what we’ll do. Get sorted out today, then tonight go back and ask Bud for the money. I’ll even come ask him on your behalf. Five hundred… that’s nothing! If you don’t nip this in the bud now, it’ll only become a bigger problem later.’ As she finished saying this, Sijiang’s name flashed on the board above the door. Huddling against Xiaohong’s back, she made her way into the ward.

  ‘When was your last period?’ a middle-aged doctor in her forties asked without looking up. Her face was so thickly covered with freckles that she was as spotted as a stretch of pavement after a swarm of sparrows had flown over.

  Sijiang hesitated, calculating.

  ‘Which of you is Li Sijiang?’ The freckled doctor looked up and, taking in both girls with a glance, turned her gaze on Xiaohong.

  ‘She is!’ Xiaohong pushed Sijiang in front of her.

  ‘When was your last period?’ Her voice sounded like the cold, metallic clamp of the forceps used in this ward. Poor Sijiang counted, whistling softly below her breath as she stood shaking before the doctor.

  ‘It ended thirty-five days ago.’ The doctor scribbled something on her notepad, her mouth moving as she wrote, as if she were copying someone else’s homework.

  ‘Are you having intercourse with your boyfriend?’ she asked in a steely tone.

  Sijiang did not answer.

  ‘Yes. She’s sleeping with her boyfriend.’ Xiaohong spoke on her friend’s behalf.

  ‘Any symptoms?’ The doctor glanced at Xiaohong, the freckles looking like a row of ants marching across her face.

  ‘Nausea every day, vomiting, no appetite…’ Sijiang searched frantically for a way to describe the desperate days of pregnancy she had endured so far. She retched as she spoke. She suddenly wished that someone would just stick a hand into her uterus and pull out the thing inside of it.

  ‘You know it’s painful, don’t you? If you’re afraid of pain, you shouldn’t do it rashly.’ As far as the doctor was concerned, it was all old hat. In her words was a cold-hearted gloating, as if she had never done it rashly herself.

  Fuck! Who does she think she is? Xiaohong cursed, hotly and silently, though she didn’t dare say anything out loud, fearing that Sijiang would suffer for any indiscretion.

  The doctor handed them a form, then took Sijiang’s blood pressure, a urine sample and did a pelvic exam. They lined up to pay, pushing their way through the crowd like a pair of piglets trying to reach a sow’s teats, each squeezing her way to a different window. When they’d finally finished, they sat and waited for the test results, fatigue slowly setting in on them.

  ‘Everything’s normal. You want to go through with the abortion? Have you ever had one before? It just takes a couple of seconds,’ the doctor said, looking over the lab results. Sijiang’s apple-shaped face was a picture of confusion. She shook her head then nodded.

  ‘Doctor, she’s nodding to your first question, and shaking her head at the second. Wait… I mean to say, she’s never had an abortion before, and she wants to have one now.’ Xiaohong stammered her way through an explanation.

  The doctor aimed a casual look at Xiaohong, as quiet as a mosquito. Xiaohong wanted to catch a good look at the spots on that face but before she could, the doctor’s glance had flitted off again.

  ‘We’re fully booked today. Come tomorrow morning and we’ll do it.’ Even speaking as softly as an insect’s buzz, her voice was cold and metallic.

  As they left the clinic, Sijiang sighed heavily. ‘Cats in heat howl the whole night long. Dogs in heat sniff each other’s backsides in search of a mate. Why do humans in heat have to go to so much trouble? Ah Hong, if I could just push it out while squatting over the crapper, everything would be alright.’ Sijiang couldn’t let go of the hope that the whole pregnancy was just a nightmare. She was like a starving person constantly imagining bread or rice. Sijiang was slowly coming to accept the reality of her sad situation. The next day, she would hand her body over to the freckled doctor.

  Surprisingly, like a single drop of water in a vast ocean, Bud’s flat nose was nowhere to be seen.

  VIII

  Five hundred yuan marked the end of Li Sijiang and Bud Kun. According to Weimei, Bud was considered pretty humane. It was as if, having been tucked away in a village for years, he had come to the city and had to embrace the sudden openness and influx of new things. Once their pockets were filled with a little cash, guys like him always wanted to try out the ‘Northern Girls’ (as the Cantonese liked to call girls who came to the city from the rural provinces), using them to create a life of leisure, or – you might say – indulgence. Most of the local guys went for the working-class women, pursuing them like male dogs sniffing at every bitch they came across. Affection grew as their ears were scratched. Though the bitch might be alert at first, eventually – whether out of vanity or because she really was flattered – she finally gave in to the male dog’s advances. He, having had his way with her, would leave as soon as he was done.

  Weimei came to the conclusion that Sijiang was fortunate she hadn’t met with some shady character and become a tool for sex, drugs and all manner of illegal activities. They were like leeches, attaching themselves firmly as suction cups to already irritated skin and sucking out the will to live. Hearing her say this, one might be led to believe Weimei had had some encounters with a shady character herself. Surprised, Xiaohong gained a new perspective on Weimei. When she repeated the words to Sijiang, she placed special emphasis on how fortunate the situation was, as if applying salve to Sijiang’s wounds.

  On their second trip to the hospital, Sijiang was surprisingly brave. She walked in front of Xiaohong with the ease of one entering the washroom in her own home, as if she had done it countless times before. Her tiny eyes shone and her footsteps were more lively. Sijiang lifted her chin and proudly thrust out her chest as she stood before the freckled doctor. The woman was visibly startled. Sijiang’s posture looked like that of someone who had come to settle accounts with the doctor.

  ‘You’ve decided to go through with the procedure today?’ This time, her voic
e was warmer, more like a set of stainless steel forceps left sitting in the sun. Her freckles began dancing across her face as her mouth pulled itself into a rare smile.

  ‘I’m doing it today. The sooner the better,’ Sijiang replied, her apple-shaped face rounder than ever.

  ‘Go and clear your bowels, then go into the operating room across the hall.’ The doctor pointed toward a door with her pen.

  ‘Doctor, I’ll go with her. She needs me,’ Xiaohong said urgently.

  She swept her eyes over Xiaohong, but did not say anything. Xiaohong took her silence as consent.

  The bloody waste in the operating room renewed Sijiang’s fears. Long-held tears began to fall from her eyes. Blood stains were everywhere, like a crimson history written on the metal surfaces and white linens of the operating room. Stainless steel forceps rested on a pan. Sijiang heard their metallic clink. With all of these cold objects, she could not conceive of how each would, in its own way, enter into her warm flesh. She retched, spitting white streams of saliva into a rubbish bin filled with blood-covered refuse. Then the dam broke and she really vomited, emptying the remaining contents of her stomach onto the bloody mound.

  ‘Hey Sijiang, don’t be afraid. It’ll be over soon.’ Xiaohong, patting Sijiang’s back, handed her a stack of tissue.

  ‘Don’t dawdle. Pants off and lie down.’ The doctor, carrying a pan in, urged impatiently. She neatly unfolded the cloth lying inside the pan, and with a series of crisp sounds lined up a set of white scissors and forceps.

  ‘Hurry up! There are a lot of patients waiting for me,’ she urged again.

  Sijiang was shy about removing her pants, and her white thighs trembled as she climbed onto the operating table. With soulless eyes, she looked innocently at the doctor.