I go back and forth between Doctor Ho in the colonnade and my mother in her bed. The questions—and the responses—seem to have little to do with my mother’s infection. That she doesn’t volunteer these details puzzles me.
After the doctor is satisfied, he writes a prescription. The scullery maid is sent to a pharmacy to pick up the herbs for the formula. The cook brews the decoction, and a few hours later, when it’s ready, it’s brought to my mother’s room. I lift the cup to her lips, and she takes a few sips before falling back on her pillow.
“It’s late,” she says in a soft voice. “You should go to bed.”
“Let me stay here. I can hold the cup for you.”
She turns her head to face the wooden panels on the back wall of the marriage bed. Her fingers press against one of them, idly wiggling it in its frame. “I will have finished the drink by the time you’ve washed your face.”
I go to my room, change into bedclothes and sleeping slippers, lie down, and nestle between the goose-down-filled mattress and a cotton quilt. I’m drained by all I’ve seen and find myself drifting off to sleep. I don’t know how much time has passed before I’m awakened abruptly by the sound of people running. In the gloom, I see Poppy sit up and yawn. She lights the oil lamp. The sputtering flame casts dancing shadows on the walls. We quickly dress and go out to the corridor. The rain has stopped, but it’s dark. The birds singing in the trees tell me dawn is coming.
Just as we reach Respectful Lady’s room, Cook rushes out and turns so swiftly that she nearly crashes into us. I totter on my bound feet, thrown off-balance. I place a hand on the wall to steady myself. When she sees me, she wipes tears from her cheeks with the backs of her hands. “So sorry. So sorry.”
The household is thrown into more commotion as Miss Zhao crosses the courtyard with Doctor Ho behind her. Without pausing, they enter Respectful Lady’s room. I start forward. Cook says, “Don’t go in there.” But I slip past her and through the door. The smell is something I will never forget.
A curtain has been hung over the front of the third chamber of my mother’s marriage bed. My father sits on a stool before it. My mother’s bare arm rests in his lap, the palm facing the ceiling. Doctor Ho tells my father to wrap Respectful Lady’s wrist in a linen handkerchief. Once my father finishes this task, the doctor steps forward and places three fingers on the cloth. He closes his eyes to concentrate, but how can he feel anything through the handkerchief?
I look away and glimpse the cup I held up to my mother last night. My heart thumps in my chest as I realize she never took another sip.
Over the next two days, the entire household is busy. Servants come and go. More herbs are brewed for “invigorating” teas. I’m once again sent in to ask Doctor Ho’s questions and return to him with Respectful Lady’s answers. Nothing helps. Respectful Lady continues to weaken. When I touch her hand or cheek, I feel burning heat. Her foot, still balanced atop the pillow, has grown to the size of a melon. Rather, a cracked melon that oozes foul-smelling fluids. A prized characteristic of a perfectly bound foot is the cleft formed when the toes come back to meet the heel of the foot. Ideally, it should be so deep that a large silver coin can slide into the crevice. Now bloody goo drips from the slit, while the red streaks have continued to climb up her leg. As the hours pass, Respectful Lady becomes less interested in the words that shower down on her, turning her face to the back wall of her enclosed bed. I’m allowed to stand next to her, to comfort her and let her know she’s not alone.
She mumbles names. “Mama. Baba.” When she cries out for my brothers who died, my index finger seeks out the heavenly flowers scars on my face.
On the fourth night, Father, Miss Zhao, and Yifeng enter. Tears stain Miss Zhao’s powdered cheeks. Even when her face shows sorrow, she is still beautiful. My father chews on the insides of his cheeks, reining in his emotions. Yifeng is too young to understand what’s happening and gallops toward the bed. My father scoops him up before he can disturb our mother. Respectful Lady raises an arm and touches my brother’s boot.
“Remember me, Son. Make offerings for me.”
After the threesome leaves, only Respectful Lady, our two maids, and I remain. The lamps are trimmed low. The gentle plink-plink of rain on the roof fills the room. My mother’s breathing slows. A breath, then a long pause. A breath, then a long pause. Again, the names of those gone fall from her lips. I don’t know if she’s looking for them or if she’s responding to their calls to her from their home in the Afterworld.
Suddenly she turns to face me. Her eyes open wide. For the first time in hours, she’s fully here.
“Come closer.” She reaches for me. I take her hand and lean in to hear. “I lament that life is like a sunbeam passing through a crack in a wall and that I won’t live to see you become a wife and mother. We won’t have the sorrows of partings or the joys of reunions. I won’t be able to help you when you have disappointments or rejoice with you in moments of good fortune.”
She once again closes her eyes and lets her head fall away from me. She doesn’t release my hand. Instead, even as she murmurs the names of the dead, she squeezes it and I squeeze back.
“To live is to suffer,” she mutters. This is her last coherent sentence. She cries, “Mama, Mama, Mama.” She mumbles my brother’s name. “Yifeng. Yifeng. Come!” She does not call for me.
I’m exhausted, but I continue to stand vigil despite the ache I feel in my feet. As tired as I am, I want to share in her pain. Mother to daughter. Life to death.
In the deepest darkness of the night, Respectful Lady takes her last breath, having reached twenty-eight years of age. I’m nearly overwhelmed by feelings of helplessness and guilt. I should have been more—a son of Respectful Lady’s own blood who would be worth living for. I should have been able to do more to help her.
The Threshold Is High
Respectful Lady is barely in the ground when the long-appointed day for my father’s departure to Beijing to make his final preparations before taking the next level of the imperial exams arrives. Miss Zhao, Yifeng, Poppy, and I are to be sent to live with my paternal grandparents in Wuxi. My father has arranged for most of the journey to be by water, and he’s hired two bodyguards to protect us. I’m allowed to choose something to keep that belonged to my mother. I pick her red wedding shoes. Crying servants pack our furniture, clothing, and other household items, which are taken away on mule-drawn carts. My mother’s personal servant is sold to a salt merchant. The cook and the scullery maid will stay until our last meal is served, but my father has sold them to… Who? Where? I’m not told. We are in mourning. I do not recite poems or the rules for girls. I do not practice my calligraphy or play the zither. Instead, I sit with Miss Zhao as she supervises my embroidery. In bed at night, after Poppy falls asleep, I hold my mother’s shoes and weep.
Miss Zhao, Poppy, my brother, and I leave six mornings after my father’s departure. Miss Zhao gives Yifeng and me pieces of candied ginger to suck. “It will help with movement illness,” she says. We step over the threshold and into the street. A part of me aches to be leaving the only place I’ve ever been, but another part is excited to see what’s outside the gate. Not much as it turns out. Miss Zhao and my brother enter a palanquin, the door is closed, and they’re carried away by four men. One of the bodyguards opens the door to the second palanquin. Poppy gives me a gentle nudge. I climb in. “I’ll follow on foot,” she says.
The palanquin jiggles as the men lift it, and we’re on our way. This is the first time I can remember being inside a palanquin. No window allows me to look outside, and the air inside is stale and hot. The box sways and bumps, responding to the individual footfalls of the bearers. I immediately feel sick to my stomach. I suck harder on the ginger. I have nowhere to settle my gaze. Outside, I hear vendors calling for customers, the creak of wagon wheels, the brays of a complaining donkey. Odors seep into the palanquin. Some I recognize—food cooked on open braziers, sewage, and something that smells like the padded fur jackets we wear in winter. I feel even more queasy.