Page 55 of The Girl with a Thousand Faces
By afternoon, you’ve usually run out of necessary things to do. This period of time you fill by writing fu talismans, which you hang on various places around the island. The first port of call is the doors and windows of this house, which Mami doesn’t comment on but also doesn’t object to. The second is the well, because you want to protect the water supply.
If there’s any spare time, you spend it ambling gently around the island. It doesn’t take long to learn the length and breadth of it, and the exercise does you a world of good. That jittery energy of yours, which has always annoyed Mami deeply, is greatly calmed by your body being in motion for so much of the day.
There’d been work in Hong Kong, too, which always kept you busy. Working in a restaurant had definitely sapped some of that overflowing energy. But there is something about walking around a rural island which you find particularly restful, and in daylight the ghosts are scared enough not to worry you.
That said, it is always a trifle… well… lonely.
For a girl who has lived in a city thronged with crowds, the island’s quiet can feel terribly stark, at times. You find yourself wishing there were at least one other person here, since Mami is such bad company. She probably feels the same about you, which doesn’t make you feel any better.
“Just one friend would do,” you say to the cat, the next time you see him. “I don’t suppose you feel like learning to talk?”
The cat yawns, showing a bright-pink mouth. He still comes by often, though he never enters the house.
“It was worth a try,” you say, and sigh.
Still, life is pleasant enough. Despite the loneliness, and the looming shadow of your father’s absence, you feel weirdly hopeful. Perhaps, you tell yourself, Baba has simply been detained, because of the war; the ports have likely shut. When the conflict ends (always thinkwhen, neverif), maybe you can go look for him.
The small fishing boats on the island’s far side, though not big enough for all the luggage, could at least get you somewhere safe in an emergency. You and Mami could reach a nearby island, if not the mainland.
Daydreaming about the end of the war, when you don’t even know what’s going on! Still, it would be a good idea to visit those other islands, sometime, even if only to get news. Mami won’t be keen, so you’ll have to do it quietly and perhaps not mention it, unless the news is very good.
You’ll go after the planting season, you decide. That makes the most sense. That gives Baba a little more time to make an appearance.
Then the typhoon arrives, and all of those plans crumble.
18THE NIGHT WE DROWNED
Thirty-three years ago…
Typhoons have always been a summer occurrence. You can’t recall seeing one earlier than May, and more commonly in June, July, or August. That’s the wet season, when the winds are dangerous and fickle.
This one comes on the first day of March.
It begins with a sunrise of blood-red clouds and strong winds, which seems to leave Mami unsettled. She keeps checking the sky, ignoring your questions. By midmorning, she is urging you to help her tack down loose items, and bring inside anything essential. You take down clothes off the line, though they’re still very damp. Buckets, tools, other odds and ends are brought in. Mami pulls tight the shutters, binding them so they won’t fling open.
Around noontime—lunch is jarred fish and raw vegetables, because Mami doesn’t think it is wise to cook—the storm begins to really spin up. The house rattles from gust after gust of unrelenting wind, and the rain sounds like hail because it hits the roof with such speed and fury.
Typhoons are not unfamiliar. They come every year, albeit usually in summer, to wallow all over the South China coast and make themselves heard. But you are used to weathering them in the safety of a city, where the buildings shield each other like little concrete turtles. Out here, exposed on the high hill of an island, it is rather frightening.
Mami’s reaction makes it worse. She huddles underneath the bed in her room like a child, wide-eyed.
“Mami? Are you okay?”
“I hate typhoons,” comes her muffled reply. “Ever since…” She trails off.
Ever since one of them destroyed this island, when she was a child. She hadn’t liked typhoons when you lived in the city, either, but maybe this was all just a little too personal. Perhaps the context is triggering some strong memories.
After some deliberation, you join her. At least it’s relatively safe here, and maybe it will make her feel better. As much as you often grate on each other, it’s hard to turn away from someone when they are clearly so terrified.
“Can I ask a question?” Reach out, touch her on the shoulder.
She recoils. “What is it?”
“Will this storm be bad?” you say. Wishing yet again that Baba had collected you both, by now. “Will the house survive?”
“It did when I was a girl.” She adds, in a voice thick with emotion, “Mine was the only house still standing, at the end.”
She doesn’t talk after that, and you don’t feel like drawing her into conversation. Together, the pair of you lie beneath the bed, uncomfortable and a little claustrophobic, while the rain pounds on the roof and the wind screams like a dying child.
