The Lost Garden

by Ang Li

  The dread I’m feeling now is worse than the last time, when he made an abrupt departure. We’ve been together less than six months, so what sort of future awaits me?

  I didn’t dare think about it.

  It was, ultimately, after our trip to Beitou, that I could, during our intimate moments together, bring myself to ask him about the girls he procured with money.

  To my surprise, the girls were not particularly lascivious nor were they all that good in bed. In fact, they liked to pretend that they were not used to it, so their clients would think they were new in the trade and lacked experience.

  So after they know the clients better, do they try to keep the men?

  Lin smiled. There isn’t much chance of that. The men are in it for fun; what’s the point in sleeping with them more than a few times?

  They ought to have techniques unmatched by the average woman, I persisted. He gave me a tender look and patiently explained things to me. Ten or twenty years ago women from good families were ignorant of such things, and only those girls knew how to please a man. Now there are videos for anyone who’s interested in watching.

  So I finally learned that I was fighting a battle I could never win. No matter how hard I tried, I could never compete with girls he could change night after night. I was destined to be powerless against a sexual life cultivated in Taipei’s business world.

  In order to win enough votes for the guild directorship, Lin agreed with Yinghong that presenting prospects of foreign investment in real estate was a workable strategy. He knew there was a lack of stability in Taiwan’s politics owing to the long-standing fear of communism and a possible invasion from the other side of the Straits, which made newly rich businessmen eager to move some of their assets off the island to reduce risk. The best investment option was, of course, the “gold country,” the target of envy for the Taiwanese.

  A real estate investment tour was organized, with help from an American company, to provide investment possibilities for midrange real estate developers who lacked the know-how to do it themselves. This could prove to be effective in getting votes. Lin himself had already checked out the hotels and rental apartments from a distance, and his dream was to buy up landmark buildings in American cities, like the Japanese corporations had done.

  Yinghong arranged an exploratory trip for the two of them, with L.A. as their first stop, for it was a city with many Taiwanese immigrants. In her contacts with American businesses, she was able to use her fluent English to her advantage; at a late-spring dinner, she knew to order the new vintage Beaujolais, chilled at the right temperature. Her pretty face and tender concern, which showed her pedigree, added a mystique to Lin Xigeng; there seemed to be something mysterious about a real estate tycoon from the East who could afford to hire such a special assistant. What connections did he have back in his own country, which had recently gotten so wealthy?, they wondered.

  Moreover, Yinghong knew the advantage of playing second fiddle; she limited herself to interpreting for him. She’d let him handle even the most insignificant inquiry and never answered for him just because she knew the language. All the time they were dealing with the Americans, she never made him feel uneasy about his lack of English proficiency; instead she made sure he understood that language was merely a tool. Given his financial status, he could have hired thousands of interpreters, but in the end, it was he, Lin Xigeng, who could make decisions without speaking a word of English.

  When they were alone after the meetings and dinners, she played out her plan to make erotic moments occur naturally in the car, though she had all the details mapped out beforehand.

  Back in Taipei, he’d always preferred to arouse her in the back of his Rolls Royce, reaching under the various types of skirts, not even deterred by a short pencil skirt. With long pencil skirts, he would ask her to shift around for him reach under. She usually tried to fend him off halfheartedly and would say no if he wanted to go further. The driver might be her own hire, but she was never naive enough to think that no one would know. Having been around Taipei’s business circles for so long, she had no faith in anyone, for she was not one of those nameless “girls,” who could simply disappear into obscurity afterward. No matter whether or not he married her, she knew she must maintain a spotless reputation to gain people’s respect.

  But she usually consented to his many demands, as long as there was some kind of cover-up. In the daytime, he would pretend to be reading the paper, which provided enough coverage for her to unzip his pants and play with his penis till it was fully erect. He would then, with a proud and confident expression, look at it, at the long, thick, dark instrument that extended beyond the hold of her slender fingers with their fair skin and bright-red nail polish.

  At night, when devoid of the excuse of a paper, she would feign fatigue and lie in his arms for comfort, though actually resting on his knees to kiss and suck on his penis. The need to avoid detection and the ruses they had to devise only added to the titillation, making them both excited.

  He would often want her to sit atop him, claiming that people could not see through the tinted windows. And as for the driver, he would think she was just being affectionate, but she would not agree to his request, no matter how persistent he was.

  Finally in L.A. on the night before they left town, they got into the black stretch limo they’d rented for the trip, after a night of proper interaction and small talk, a champagne toast for future successful cooperation, and the American-style good-bye of hugging and kissing.

  She had chosen the limo chauffeur herself. A young white man, he had a sincere smile, earnest enough to promote the American Dream. From a quick inquiry at the car rental agency and casual conversation later, she learned that driving the limo was a part-time job for him, as he had come to L.A. for other prospects, such as Hollywood. Of course. Why not?

  On the spring night before they returned to Taiwan, she asked the chauffeur to drive around L.A.’s prime residential areas and main thoroughfares, with the full knowledge that they could drive around for hours in sprawling downtown, even at night, when there was less traffic.

  “Let’s experience the magic of L.A. at night.” She said to the young man with a smile.

  Then she began to lead him on, without him asking her to, though she was trembling slightly out of nervousness. Lin immediately knew what he’d be able to do that night.

  “Is it safe?” he whispered, biting her ear.

  She nodded.

  “Then ask the driver to tilt the rearview mirror.” He said leisurely, but it sounded like an order.

  She slid open the glass partition and, in a dry, unnatural voice, relayed Lin’s request. The young driver complied, calm and composed, like his American smile. He didn’t look surprised, so obviously this was not the first time for him.

  Lin began to take over. As she shrank into the seat, with a practiced hand, he removed Yinghong’s clothes until he was able to touch her freely. Blocking her with his broad shoulders, he kissed and played with her breasts but always on the alert to quickly cover up what they were doing.

  Fondling and oral sex were what he liked most from her, so his eyes were nearly shut as he enjoyed the pleasure, though he still cast an occasional glance at the world outside the car window.

  The streets of L.A., with more than ten lanes of traffic, were just about devoid of pedestrians, and his mind was put at ease, as the car rolled along at a steady pace.

  His skill from practice and total control also made her feel safe. Though tall and big with long limbs, he had enough room to maneuver in the spacious limousine, so Yinghong, smaller in size, did not feel crowded, as she had thought.

  He guided her in changing positions to increase the pleasure and comfort, which enabled her to once again experience his awe-inspiring style. A sense of submission and dependence turned her body supple and lithe, and, under his instruction, that softened body was able to easily accomplish several difficult positions and unfamiliar moves. Total relaxation a
nd reciprocation led her to forget herself completely, and all she felt was bodily, carnal pleasure.

  Feeling disrupted each time the car stopped at a red light, she began to complain about all the stoplights in L.A. While waiting for a light to change, the chauffeur showed visible unease, suddenly not knowing what else to do; moreover, the vehicles that came up to them on both sides gave her the feeling that the windows were useless and that the drivers of the other cars could see what they were doing.

  Right after they were done and had tidied up, Lin lowered the window, sending late-spring evening wind onto her sweaty face; caught unprepared, she let out a startled cry.

  “Can’t you smell it all over the car?” he teased, while reaching out to put his arm around her.

  Without the dark windows, L.A.’s night lights leaped into her field of vision in all their glory. As the car drove along, the city seemed to suddenly come alive and became something real; she no longer felt that it was merely a Hollywood set, as viewed earlier through the windows, where the darkened, understated city seemed to be an endless, unconnected background, existing just for cars to drive through.

  It was like opening your eyes again to see the real world outside, making the earlier lovemaking scene in the car more like a dream. Tears welled up in her eyes.

  “You’ll remember me, won’t you?” She stammered, “There have to be some moments … that will stay with you.”

  He held her tightly.

  “Silly,” he said tenderly.

  She recalled the conversation in Japanese with Father in the backseat of his newly purchased Mercedes, which was still being driven by the consulate driver, after Father had explained to the driver, who obviously knew no Japanese, that this was their daily language of choice.

  “When I was a boy, your grandfather had a black Japanese sedan. He taught a man how to drive so he could have a properly trained chauffeur.”

  She listened quietly, head lowered, as dictated by their family upbringing; she did not even turn to look at the scenery passing by outside, despite her urge to do so.

  “Back then the family driver did not wear a uniform. Your grandpa was so considerate he did not want people to detect the driver’s status from the uniform. He often said that ours was a big family in which we were all equals.”

  Father paused.

  “I recall his name—Ah-bing. He wore gloves when he drove. He treasured the car and did not want to soil the steering wheel if he happened to have dirty hands. Ah-bing always sat up straight, his hands resting on the upper curve of the steering wheel with his elbows turned in to maintain a certain angle between arms and body. You would never see him flail his arms to turn the wheel.”

  Immersed in his recollections, Father began to smile.

  “When Ah-bing made a turn, he never turned the wheel all the way; instead, he did it slowly, little by little.”

  Father looked up to watch the traffic in front of them.

  “You’ll see how the driver makes the turn when we get to an intersection.”

  The anticipation made her sit up with excitement during this, her first ride in the family Mercedes. Father and daughter strained to search for an intersection, while the car moved at a leisurely pace, letting trees and farmhouses in the Lucheng outskirts recede one by one. The car seemed to glide over the bumpy, unpaved road.

  They encountered no intersections that day until they reached the provincial highway, where the driver needed to make a wide left turn. And indeed, as Father had said, the trained driver did not swing the steering wheel when he turned. Instead, he moved his hands several times to inch the vehicle elegantly to the left. They got onto the asphalt provincial highway without swaying back and forth.

  She turned to look at her father and they both smiled.

  TWO

  Yinghong had heard since childhood that her mother’s beauty was widely celebrated.

  “Pretty, just like a Japanese lady,” they said. “Lady” was used only for pretty women, and since Japanese women were pretty, they were called Japanese ladies. Taiwanese women were not refined enough back then to deserve to be called ladies.

  “Have you ever heard of a Taiwanese lady?” Even Mudan felt that way.

  Yinghong was too young to know what it meant to be pretty; her understanding of the concept came mostly from mirrors.

  In those days, mirrors were mostly oval-shaped, about two feet from top to bottom, with a mercury surface and a support base made of thick coiled wire. As a child, Yinghong did not like to look at herself in a mirror; what attracted her were the colorful photographs of movie stars adhered to the back, popular icons and what the people called beauties such as Asaoka Ruriko, Wakao Fumiko, and Mitsumoto Fujiko.

  They were always smiling, revealing slightly crooked front teeth, a common trait among Japanese women. There were usually one or two exposed small canines as well; their uneven teeth added a childlike quality to their faces. Before technology for color printing was perfected, the colors would sometimes be slightly off, shifting the red for the lips to below the mouth, thus adding a second pair of red lips beneath white teeth, while the face remained smiling. Or the eyeliner would be printed to one side, as if the subject had double eyes. In any case, you could still see the double folds of the eyes, the long thin brows, the high nose, and tiny mouth, all in all, the perfect picture of a beauty.

  Her mother was a beauty like that, with well-proportioned features, a nose with a straight and high bridge, eyes that were not too big beneath deep and long double-folded lids that slanted slightly upward at the corners. Her brows were long and nicely arched, like crescent moons, with modest shadows. Downy hair grew around the edges of her brows, making them especially graceful and alluring. Her mouth was small, but her lips were fleshy, a perfect match for the preferred solid yet gentle look of the time.

  Yinghong had kept an enlarged photo of her mother in middle age. A black-and-white photo, taken by her father, of course, it was a foot high, and hand-colored, a substitute before color photo was invented. Vermillion lips, black eyes and brows; all clearly marked. Her hair, in tiny curls combed back to the sides, gave her a bewitching look. Father had added pink to her cheeks to represent rouge, while the smudges of blue and green were eye shadow, which he had copied from photos of movies stars.

  Many years later, when she rushed back from America to Lotus Garden for Father’s funeral, Mother’s face looked just like that hand-colored, but faded photo; her features remained the same, just suddenly decades older.

  After the funeral, Yinghong’s two brothers had to leave the country immediately, for their visas to Taiwan, obtained through special channels, would not permit them to stay long. They had to leave before the postfuneral seven-day rites were performed.

  On the night before they left Lotus Garden, Mother took an old account book out of a drawer of a craftsman’s desk from an upstairs room in Lotus Tower. It had been put away with care, but still looked tattered; the original cobalt blue cover had faded to a dark gray. Her mother’s graceful handwriting in ink, recording in Japanese the dates and places of transactions of every piece of family property, graced the red-lined cotton paper.

  “Your father was not a spendthrift even in his youth,” Mother began slowly in Japanese, obviously prepared for this conversation.

  “In high school, young men his age from wealthy families began to frequent the red-light district, on the pretext that they were there to compose poetry, an elegant act of social life. But your father never had any of the bad habits that commonly afflicted the wealthy young, nor did he consider such degenerate behavior the norm.”

  Mother looked far and deep into the distance.

  “When I married into the Zhu family, your father had just returned from travels in Europe after finishing his studies in Japan; he took over the Zhu family business, while devoting himself to perfecting the first modern high school, which the Zhu family had established, with the intention of promoting cultural activities and waking up the Taiwanese to re
sist foreign rule. Then the incident occurred.”

  Mother paused briefly, highlighting the sound of the late-autumn gale howling in Lotus Garden. Cold wind seeped in through the latticed windows, gently tousling her gray hair.

  She was sitting up straight on a purple sandalwood armchair in the small second-floor parlor. A tall woman, she maintained the usual pose of holding her body away from the back of the chair and placing her feet close together on the octagonal floor tiles. She was wearing a black two-piece dress, a jacket with old-fashioned upturned collars, and a skirt that fell below her knees. Yinghong had never seen her mother in a qipao or Taiwanese-style pantsuit. In her memory, that black dress came with a hat in the same color, but Mother was not wearing it that night.

  “I thought I’d never see your father again, but he returned. Even though he was more or less a prisoner in Lotus Garden, at least he was back home.” Mother took a deep breath. “After the incident, I had to take over everything in the house. When he was in prison, everyone in the clan, convinced that he would never come out, wanted to divide up the family property. At the time, cutting off all ties with us was the best method for self-preservation, and I never begrudged them that.”

  Her voice sounded neutral, far-reaching, as if narrating someone else’s story.

  “As the first grandson of the first son, your father was given the most worthless and remote property, land that was only good for a garden, not suitable for farming. The good rice fields and houses in the city were all taken by your uncles. Except that no one could have predicted that a few years later, when the policy of Land to the Tillers was implemented, most of the dozens of jia of rice paddies they’d gotten would be appropriated. And us, we were not only able to keep our land, but it turned out to be in the heart of the city, when city planning began, new roads were paved, and new zoning laws were applied.”

  The flicker of a serene smile flashed across Mother’s old, sallow face.