Chenxi and the Foreigner Read online

  At a red traffic light, just as Anna had the phrase she was searching for, Chenxi sat upright. He wound down his window and shouted at someone. Anna strained to see who he was calling, but a hundred identical faces stared in at her.

  Chenxi turned to her, smiling. ‘He my school friend. You OK I leave you go home? Him driver know where you home. I go with my friend?’

  He touched Anna on the knee.

  ‘Of course…’ And he was gone, whistling and yelping into the crowd. A light fingerprint tingled the skin on her knee. She looked up and the driver’s narrow eyes stared at her. Anna turned back to the window.

  The crowded street emptied into a lane where children scattered, and washing hung from bamboo poles overhead. In darkened doorways walnut-faced old ladies squatted over plucked feathers and vegetable peelings. Anna knew at once that this wasn’t the way she had come with Chenxi. She bit the inside of her cheek.

  The driver slowed to a halt.

  Anna leant forward, alarmed. ‘Yandang Apartments!’ she cried, waving the scrap of paper her father had given her. ‘Yandang Lu!’

  ‘OK, OK, OK!’ The driver shooed away her hand. He opened his door and sidled out of the cab, which steamed and ticked in the heat. Instantly, snub noses pressed against the windows. Everyone had come to inspect her. The roar of the traffic sounded far away. Anna sat back, her heart flipping like a fish, and stared ahead. On the radio, the Opera was building in tempo—cats wailing and saucepans crashing. Chairman Mao beamed malevolently down at her.

  The driver returned with an old woman on one arm and a huge watermelon in the other. Around him, his family stared in at the pale sweating foreigner and called, ‘Hellooo! Hellooo!’ The old woman, with staring yellow eyes and a gummy smile, reached in from the driver’s open door and touched Anna’s head, nodding and cooing as her fingers fondled the hair.

  Finally, when his family had all enjoyed a look, the driver got back in the taxi, set the watermelon on the seat beside him, and started the engine. From the lane, the car eased back into familiar traffic. Anna’s face burned in anger and humiliation at having been treated like a circus freak by the taxi driver, and because Chenxi had deserted her. She swore she would never allow herself to be so easily taken advantage of again. Chenxi was being paid good money to look after her! Next time she wouldn’t allow herself to fall for his charms.

  3

  Day dissolved into evening. The colours of the sunset tinged the smoggy grey sky. Restaurants opened. Men in suits with fake designer labels sewn on the cuffs squatted in the doorways, smoking. A noodle seller packed up his stall to make way for the competition. The people who ate this late wouldn’t be interested in a bowl of noodles. Night dining was for foreigners, for making deals, for exchanging cigarettes and handshakes. Spending money to make money. All beyond this old man. He earned enough to get by with his noodle soup and ration tickets. Making money was for young people. For them it was about getting rich to go to America. He considered himself fortunate just to have survived the terrors of the past.

  He swept the concrete pavement in front of his stall. Noodles, spit and cockroaches swirled into the gutter. Night fell and a breeze lifted the damp heat of the day. The old man wiped his hand across his smeary brow. ‘Come on, you two,’ he said to the youths in the back corner. ‘I want to go home.’

  The two young men looked up from their conversation, surprised to find that darkness had crept in around them. Chenxi dragged on the butt of his cigarette, the orange glow lighting his face, then flicked it out into the street. ‘Sorry, Gramps. We’re going, we’re going.’

  His friend, Lao Li, unwound his gangling legs from beneath the grimy laminex table and stood up, ducking to miss the swinging light bulb as he headed for the door.

  ‘Here, Gramps,’ Chenxi said, draping his arm around the old man’s shoulder. He winked and slipped a note into the withered hand. ‘For your trip to America!’

  The two young men guffawed as they vaulted onto the rusty bikes that leant against the shop.

  The old man looked into his palm at the brand new F.E.C. shining there. He watched the youths wheel off down the deserted street and shook his head. What trouble were they up to now?

  ‘Hey, let’s go to a bar!’ Chenxi said, his cheeks flushed and his spirit daring from the rice wine he had shared with his friend. He rode ahead and looped a figure eight until Lao Li caught up. ‘What do you say? The fancy one on Huai Hai Lu?’

  Lao Li grinned, his speech slurred. ‘You can’t go there! It’s for foreigners!’

  Chenxi patted the wad of F.E.C. in his pocket. ‘I’m Japanese and you’re from Taiwan!’

  Lao Li laughed. ‘They’ll never believe us!’

  ‘Come on, man. Money talks. Foreign money talks the loudest of all!’

  Lao Li shook his head. But he knew he would follow his crazy friend. He always did.

  Giggling and snorting, Chenxi and Lao Li hid their bikes in the shrubbery near the entrance to the bar. Chenxi did his shirt up to the neck to hide his tattered singlet and Lao Li slicked back the floppy shanks of his fringe. They looked at each other, pulling serious faces before bursting into laughter again.

  A heavily made up local girl with a short skirt and high heels tripped by, supported on the arm of a well dressed foreigner. She glanced towards Chenxi’s handsome face as she passed. The foreign man held open the heavy glass door and they slipped into the smoke and sultry music.

  ‘OK,’ whispered Chenxi. ‘Let’s go.’

  At the door a stone-faced Chinese man in a dinner suit stood with his arms crossed. As Chenxi and Lao Li approached, the man frowned and his head sank back into his neck.

  ‘Hi!’ Chenxi said in English. ‘We here meet some friends.’

  The man continued to stare into the bushes.

  Chenxi tried another tactic. Slipping into Mandarin, he pleaded, ‘Come on, man, my friend’s hurt. We’ve got to get him inside. He needs something to drink!’

  Lao Li grabbed his throat on cue, gasping and nodding. No response.

  ‘Here,’ Chenxi said, resorting to Shanghainese. ‘A little something for your trouble.’ He pulled out the wad of F.E.C. and fanned himself with it. The man stared straight ahead. Chenxi picked out one of the notes and slipped it into the man’s top pocket, the way he had seen them do in American movies. The man didn’t blink. Chenxi reached for the door. Out slid the man’s fat hand and held Chenxi’s wrist in a firm grip. This time he looked straight into Chenxi’s eyes. They stood locked like that for many heartbeats until Lao Li put his hand on his friend’s shoulder.

  ‘Come on, Chenxi. Let’s go.’

  ‘No way!’ Chenxi muttered, still staring into the unblinking face. ‘I’m going in.’

  The heavy glass door swung open. A small Chinese man with a hairy mole on his cheek stepped out of the smoke and the music. He finished his conversation with someone inside before turning and smiling at Chenxi.

  ‘Now, what seems to be the problem?’ he said to Chenxi in Shanghainese.

  Chenxi tried to remember who had said he looked Japanese. He wasn’t fooling anyone.

  ‘No problem,’ Chenxi smiled back. ‘Just want to go in for a drink.’

  ‘You know that’s not possible,’ the man said, shaking a long fingernail at Chenxi. Two big Chinese men appeared on either side of him. Both of them were dressed in stylish grey suits and leered ominously.

  ‘Come on, Chenxi,’ Lao Li whispered.

  ‘I have F.E.C.’ Chenxi said. He emphasised the acronym as if it was the secret code to his entry. The code that would open all doors.

  ‘That’s nice,’ said the man pleasantly. ‘You can spend it in America then!’ And he turned towards the door.

  Chenxi stepped forwards. The two big men in suits stepped in front of him, blocking the entrance to the bar. One of them sneered, daring him to attempt to push past them. Chenxi raised his hand—a feeble gesture of peace— but a fist seemed to shoot out from nowhere catching him on the shoulder. He foun
d himself reeling over the stairs. A slow second passed. His skull hit the pavement with a thud.

  The manager shook his head and turned back to the bar, his men closing in behind him. Chenxi lay still, waiting for his vision to come back into focus, waiting for the anger rising in him to subside. Lao Li crouched beside him. Chenxi sat up and dabbed the back of his head with his fingertips, feeling the sticky blood. The man at the door stared down at him.

  ‘Come on,’ Lao Li urged. ‘Let’s get out of here!’

  For an instant Chenxi thought of charging. It would mean he would shed more blood, and it would almost be worth it to mess up their crisp white shirts. But Lao Li was at his side, imploring Chenxi to walk away.

  Chenxi stood up and spat. ‘I wouldn’t want to drink your fuckin’ foreign wine, anyway.’

  4

  Anna woke to the sound of music. Loud and crackly, sentimental jazz. And behind that, a high pitched counting in Chinese numbers, keeping time. Anna knew that beat. One, two, three...Two, two, three. A waltz?

  In a daze, she sat up. Her surroundings, the new noises, drew together in her mind like pieces of a puzzle. Her father let out a snore in the next room. The puzzle snapped into place. Her second day in Shanghai was about to start.

  Kicking the cotton sheet from her sweaty body, Anna shuffled along the bed to where she could sit by the window. From the thirteenth floor, she had a clear view of Fuxing Park. Directly beneath her was a group of waltzers. There were about twenty of them, mostly women dancing with other women, while an instructor on the side kept time through a megaphone. Anna giggled. Waltzing at six o’clock in the morning! She would have to write all this down before it seemed commonplace to her.

  From her bedside drawer, Anna pulled out the journal her mother had given her a few days before she left Melbourne. Perhaps her mother had instinctively known that she wouldn’t be hearing from her daughter much, once Anna had arrived in Shanghai, and the journal was a way of staying close. Anna was relieved to have some time away from her mother who had become too dependent on her. Now that her mother didn’t have a husband to lean on, Anna felt like she had been forced into the role of her emotional support and confidante. Let one of my sisters deal with her moods for a change, Anna thought. I’m here for a break. For an adventure!

  She smoothed open the first page of the small book.

  April 4th, 1989

  Here I am, finally, in Shanghai! I am looking out of my bedroom window from Dad’s apartment and the view is amazing. I can see right over Fuxing Park. It’s only 6 am but already the park is full of life—it’s like my own private entertainment! Below me there are waltzers and, to the right of them, a solitary old man hugs a tree. Behind him, another old man jiggles on the spot. Across a path lined with peonies, tai-chi is beginning. I watch the slow perfect fanning of limbs.

  I could sit at this window for hours, days, weeks; the park is like an ever-changing Bruegel painting with minute detail to be discovered. But unfortunately I don’t have months in Shanghai, only weeks, and even though I thought my time here with Dad would drag, I am not so sure now. I have only been here a day but I already have a date (sort of) with the most beautiful-looking man I have ever laid eyes upon! So, I have to get moving because he is picking me up in just over an hour.

  What to wear? I wish it wasn’t so hot because I’ve brought all the wrong clothes and I can’t imagine how I will find anything here to fit me. All the girls in Shanghai are so tiny. I feel like a great hulking sweaty blob! And they all seem to wear frilly girly dresses and high heels—very different from my shorts and jeans. I wonder if Chenxi likes girls in jeans?

  Anna’s father’s alarm rang through the thin plaster wall and she crept out of bed to use the shower before he did. Then she slipped on a pair of shorts and a T-shirt, the lightest clothing she had brought with her, and joined her father in the kitchen.

  They breakfasted together. Muesli and milk, toast and jam. If you had F.E.C. you could shop at the foreign supermarkets and eat the same food as back home.

  Before he left for work, Mr White slipped a few more of the paper bank notes into Anna’s hand. They seemed to grow inside his wallet. Then he added some advice on how to get by in Shanghai. ‘Remember, xie xie is thank you, and don’t eat at the street stalls. The Hilton Hotel has a good hamburger restaurant if you need lunch.’

  ‘It’s OK, Dad. I’ll be with Chenxi. He’s coming to pick me up for college today.’ She had decided it would be better not to mention yesterday’s desertion if she wanted her father to continue paying Chenxi to be her translator and guide.

  ‘Yes, look darling, I know it sounds like a lovely idea to study a bit of Chinese painting, but don’t feel you have to go. I’ve got plenty of good videos here and you can catch a taxi into town to meet me for lunch, if you like. You are on holidays, remember? I’ll take you to the consulate on Friday night for drinks. You might meet some foreign students your age that you can make friends with.’

  ‘Chenxi is my age, Dad. He’s only nineteen,’ Anna reminded her father.

  Mr White stood in front of the hallway mirror to adjust his tie, ignoring her response. ‘Hey, they’ve got a pool at the consulate! You could go for a swim today. That would be a nice idea, wouldn’t it? It’s very hot to be riding all the way out to the college.’

  Anna was irritated by her father’s protectiveness. And why did he have to assume that she would want to share his sheltered expatriate lifestyle? She wasn’t in China to meet Australians! ‘I’ll see how I go, Dad. It’s not that far. Chenxi took me past the college yesterday on the way to buy my art materials.’

  Her father still wasn’t listening. He’d had another thought. ‘I know, love! Rather than go to the college every day we could get one of the teachers to come out here to teach you. At the apartment. And get that boy, Chenksy, too, to translate.’

  ‘Dad! I said I’ll see how I go. I’ll be fine, OK?’

  ‘Yes, see how you go, love. Just remember to take my work number with you, and plenty of money in case you have any problems.’ He wiped his mouth on his handkerchief. ‘And don’t worry about cleaning up, the aiyi will do it.’

  After he left, Anna wandered to the sitting room window that looked over the front entrance of their building. From here she could see anyone who came into the building or left it. She watched her father get into the back of his navy car with tinted windows and thought how absurd it was that he complained of putting on weight. If he rode to work like the other sixteen million inhabitants of Shanghai, he would be as skinny as they were. Instead, he preferred to pay a fortune to ride a stationary bike in an exclusive ‘foreigners only’ gym.

  Seven-thirty came and went, then eight o’clock, then nine. Anna had never been a patient person. She liked looking forward to something, but she hated waiting. By nine-thirty she knew Chenxi wasn’t coming. Classes had started over an hour ago and, with a forty minute bike ride ahead of her, Anna wondered if she would get to see any of the first lessons at all.

  Why wouldn’t he come? They had spent a pleasant afternoon together the day before—at least she thought so—seeing the sights of Shanghai in the air-conditioned comfort of a taxi. She had felt giddy sitting so close to him in the back seat, absorbing the smell of him, studying his beautiful face. She had gone to bed that night dreaming of him, feeling sure he would have done the same about her. If you were attracted to someone, weren’t they necessarily attracted to you? But Chenxi’s face gave away nothing. The picture of that warm apologetic smile in the taxi before he disappeared into the traffic materialised constantly in Anna’s mind.

  She wasn’t sure why she was so obsessed with him. After all, she barely knew him. But there was something about him that pushed all reason out of her mind. He was so mysterious, so unselfconsciously handsome. She had never felt like this about anyone before. Perhaps he had a girlfriend? Was that why he wasn’t coming? If so, he should have made it clear from the start. Surely he could feel Anna’s attraction towards him? So why d
id he smile at her that way? She started to feel angry again.

  Wasn’t it an honour for him to be chosen out of all the students at the college to look after her? Her father said that any other Chinese student would have cut off his right arm for the opportunity. And all that F.E.C. he’d given Chenxi? According to her father it was virtually impossible for a student in China to get hold of the foreigners’ currency— other than by illegal means. Local Chinese currency was supposed to have the same value as the F.E.C., but it couldn’t be exchanged outside China. So one yuan in F.E.C. could be traded for up to twice as many local yuan on the black market. Not only that, but with F.E.C. a Chinese could buy foreign goods and have access to places where only foreigners were allowed. Chenxi should be grateful for the opportunity they were offering him! Anna stood up, frustrated and irritable. Should she go to the consulate pool after all?

  She was deciding whether to exchange the bamboo and wolf hair paint brushes in her bag for her bikini, when the doorbell rang. Of course he had come, why wouldn’t he? She flung the bag over her back and skipped to the door, but a key fiddled in the lock and it was opened before she had a chance to reach it. Both women found themselves face to face with a stranger.

  The aiyi was the first to speak, ‘Oh, sorry, sorry. Daughter? You Mr White daughter?’

  ‘Yes,’ Anna said, disappointed. ‘You must be the aiyi?’

  The young woman looked very dressed up for a cleaning maid. Her hair was tied up at the back in a glittery, gauzy clasp and frizzed out at the front. She wore make-up, a shiny pink blouse and the strappy high heels that seemed to be so fashionable among the women in Shanghai.