The Language of Threads (34 page)

“Come, hurry!” the man yelled, the words carried to her on the ocean spray. Li's feet had turned to stone, sinking into the depths. The next thing she knew, the man was beside her, his arm wrapped tightly around her waist as he swam her limp body to the boat. She swallowed salt water, coughing it back up as the younger man on the boat reached over and pulled her aboard. Li stood on deck, weaving from side to side with the constant rocking motion.

“You'll stay down here,” the younger man directed. He removed the heavy wooden cover to the fish hole and directed Li to hurry and climb down. She was shivering, standing on the windy deck, the two men obviously annoyed at her slowness.

“Now!” the older man yelled.

He held a lantern over the hole so she could see the wooden ladder and find her footing. Only when Li descended the slippery ladder into the dark, stinking hole did she realize there were other people waiting down there, the flicker of light illuminating their ghostly faces as they blinked. Before they were returned to darkness, the wooden cover closing with a final thud over their heads, she saw a handful of adults and a child. Her foot left the last rung and touched water, knee-deep by the time her two feet were planted firmly on the bottom of the boat. She couldn't stand up straight, and stooped low against the ceiling. Though she had seen at least five other people crammed into the small hole, no one said a word. It was darker than any night, and when she tried to take a step in any direction, she ran into an arm or a leg.

“I'm sorry,” she whispered.

A child whimpered.

“Over here.” A woman's voice. “To your left.”

Li inched left and felt a body move over with a soft sweep of water, so that there was enough room for her to squat and then sit. The burst of fresh air that had come in when the wooden lid was lifted was now gone. The hot, humid air stank of fish and sweat and she didn't dare imagine what else. The gash on her leg burned as she sat in the tepid water up to her waist. She was so thirsty that her throat felt like sand.

“How long have you been waiting here?” Li asked, the words coming out slowly.

“Hours,” the woman's voice said.

“Are there any more coming?”

A man laughed sarcastically. “Where would they put them? Six adults and a child stuffed into a box. As it is, we're one step away from suffocating!”

“Then save what little breath you have left!” the woman next to her snapped.

“They take our good money and crowd us in a hole for dead fish,” the man persisted.

“Ssh!” Another voice.

The child moaned, “I don't feel good.”

“Soon, soon,” her mother's voice said soothingly.

The boat creaked and suddenly groaned to life. It jerked once or twice, then began to move slowly.

“We go, we go,” the mother repeated.

Li could barely see the outline of the mother's pale hand rise up and down again as if she were about to sing a song. But the dark hole was silent, the bobbing of the boat growing as they sailed out to sea, rolling and rising with each wave. Li felt her stomach rise and fall along with the boat, and braced herself to keep from toppling onto the woman next to her. She leaned back against the damp, slimy wall. Her clothes were soaked and every muscle in her body ached. The air was so thick, she felt as if they were all sharing the same breath. She sucked in her share, trying hard to stay conscious.

“I feel sick,” the child whispered, breaking the dark silence.

“No, you're fine,” the mother whispered back. “Think of happy times,” she said encouragingly.

Li closed her eyes and tried to think of happier times. Her leg burned and felt numb. Happiness was always a word just beyond her reach. She thought of scant moments with Kaige and Yuan when they were small, then had to travel all the way back to her childhood, to afternoons when she and Pei were finished with their chores and could run outside to play.

“This way, this way!” Pei would call. “Come see the babies.”

Li followed without question. They wandered way down into the mulberry groves, farther than their parents had ever allowed them to go.

“It's too far,” she said.

Pei didn't pay any attention. “When you see the birds, you'll know it was worth it.”

Li wasn't sure it would be worth Baba's strap, but she kept walking. At the very edge of the grove, Pei cleared away some tall brush to expose a nest of twigs and grass, two chirping baby birds peeking out.

Li fell to her knees. “How did you know they were here?”

“I heard them calling for their mother. She always goes away at this time of the day to find them food.”

She wanted to touch them, but Pei stopped her. “The mother will know we were here and she might not love them anymore.”

Li's hand stopped in midair. She couldn't imagine a mother not loving such tiny, helpless creatures. They watched the little birds reach out toward them, their beaks opening and closing, opening and closing.

The sound of the child throwing up woke Li. A sour smell filled the thick air. Li felt something in her own stomach turn again, a bitterness rising up to her mouth even as she tried in vain to swallow it back down again.

Six or seven hours later, when the blessed stupor of half-sleep finally came to Li, she was abruptly awakened. The wooden cover scraped open and a sudden flow of fresh air and daylight entered the hole. It took a few minutes for the fresh air to revive the passengers. Their slow, lethargic movements made Li realize how close to being dead they really were.

“Everyone out!” the man yelled down to them.

Li blinked against the light. For the first time, she was able to see the people with whom she'd made the journey. There were two men, an older woman, two younger women, and the little girl, who appeared only semiconscious. Her mother was patting her cheeks. “Up, up, we're here, we're here,” she repeated. One by one they climbed up the ladder into the daylight.

Once on deck, Li saw that they weren't
there:
no tall buildings, no Pei waiting for her. The boat had pulled close to shore, where another boat waited. Li looked just bewildered enough for the
bearded man who had saved her life last night to point to it and explain: “That boat will take you on to Hong Kong. Still a good two hours away.” He poured a mouthful of water into a tin cup and let her drink from it.

Li looked up and tried to smile, to give him some small sign of gratitude, but he had already turned away.

The last leg of the voyage was luxurious compared to what they had endured earlier. They gulped down mouthfuls of fresh air as if to store it for later, before descending into another small, dark hole. But this one was dry, and they were given a lantern to see the extent of their exhaustion as they sat squeezed side by side. The child had fallen asleep again on her mother's lap. The old woman pointed to Li's leg and said, “You'd better have that taken care of.”

Li smiled at her concern, then finally dared to look down in the flickering light to see the swollen wound. A jagged line, not like the puckered curve that ran across her cheek. There was only a slight throbbing now to remind her of it. Li was too tired to think about anything but sleep.

The dull thuds of footsteps on deck and muffled voices yelling from above let them know that Hong Kong was in sight. They were told they would be released near the beach village of Shek O, on the other side of the island. Li's heart raced. She wished she still had her cloth sack with some clean clothes to change into. Her white tunic was soiled and her trousers torn. Pei wouldn't recognize her—or worse, wouldn't want to.

Again, they were hurried up on deck. The mountains of Hong Kong rose before them, greener than Li had expected. In the distance she saw a group of people gathered together at the edge of the rocks, waiting. She paused for just a moment, balancing herself against the side of the boat, wondering if Pei was among
them, and how would Pei recognize her after so many years? The unkindness of life was etched so deeply into her face.

The fishing boat anchored offshore, only this time Li didn't hesitate to enter the cold water. She leaped in and thrust herself through the water, arms and legs working with all the strength she had left. The waves pushed her back then forward, until her feet touched the rock and sand bottom. She wiped the water from her eyes, the glare of the sun burning. Li heard the splashing of the others behind her and in front of her as she struggled to walk the last heavy steps onto the beach. Every muscle in her body hurt as she stumbled and fell to her knees. From the corner of her eye, Li saw a woman running into the water toward her, a tall shadow lifting her by the arms and holding her against the warmth of her own body. Li looked up into the woman's eyes and knew instantly it was Pei.

“You're here,” Pei whispered just once, her fingers touching the scar on Li's cheek so gently it felt like a flutter of small kisses.

1951–52

“There will be illness, but she will survive”: The fortune-teller's prediction for Li didn't come true until she arrived in Hong Kong. The years of being battered and bruised had toughened her body and spirit to fight for each day of survival. The moment she relaxed into the warmth and comfort of family, she fell ill. And after so many hours aboard the cramped fishing boat, wet and exhausted, a terrible infection developed from the cut on her leg.

It took Li three months to recover fully, with Pei at her side day and night. Song Lee watched her like a hawk and rushed down to the old herbalist every week for blood-strengthening teas. Each day, she made sure Li drank down the dark, muddy-looking liquid. When she saw the color begin to return to her cheeks, Song Lee clapped her hands in triumph and said, “You can see her energy returning gradually, a good sign that it will stay with her. If it comes too fast, it can be deceiving.”

And slowly Pei and Li began to know each other again, catching each sigh and gesture, trying to remember what they were like as girls and learn who they'd become as women. The words came haltingly at first, and then they wouldn't stop. Like water, they filled two thirsty throats. In between the discoveries were
pockets of stillness, memories that stayed silent and secret, along with the curiosities and wonder that didn't.

Li smiled and sat up in bed a month after she'd arrived. “You were always tall.”

“And you still have Ma Ma's fine hair.”

Li shyly touched her short gray hair and shook her head. “I feel too old. Like something broken.”

Pei sat down on the side of her bed. “Then it's time for you to mend,” she said, placing her hand on top of Li's.

Li leaned back against the wall, her scar almost translucent in the white sunlight. “When I awoke that morning and you had already gone with Baba to the silk village, it was as if I'd lost a part of myself.”

“I thought you would be happy to have me out of your hair!” Pei teased.

“Yes”—Li smiled—“you were a handful. But you were the one who helped me to judge my own worth. If you were naughty, I was obedient, if you ran too fast, I slowed down. With you gone, I was alone. Ma Ma was burdened with everyday life, Baba had his pond and groves. The quiet in our house was deafening.”

Pei swallowed. She hadn't known. She'd always thought their lives would be easier without her. “I didn't know,” she whispered. “At first I thought I was being punished. Given away because I never listened.”

“And I believed I was being left behind,” Li said sadly.

“Is that why you married the farmer?” Pei asked. She unconsciously moved to touch the back of her chignon.

Li paused for a moment and closed her eyes. “There weren't many choices left for me.” She opened her eyes and turned her head so that the smooth edge of her scar showed.

Pei stood up and opened a window. She didn't want Li to see the tears brimming in her eyes. “It's milder today.” She cleared her throat.

“I've always wondered, Pei . . .” Li began; then she leaned
forward and waited for her sister to come close again. “What was your life like, doing the silk work?”

Pei answered thoughtfully, “It was lonely at first and very hard.” She walked back to the bed. “Then the girls' house and the sisterhood became the home I no longer had, and the family in which I learned about life's injustices and love's kindness.”

Pei reached for Li's hand and looked into her sister's familiar eyes, dark brown and knowing that a life was filled with many stories—myriad of parts that made up the whole. She would tell Li all of her stories one at a time, and each day from that moment on, they would create new ones together.

It was as if she'd awakened from a long, endless nightmare to finally be in Hong Kong with Pei. After she'd recovered from her illness, Li walked slowly forward into her new life, taking tentative, careful steps. It took a good week for Pei to persuade her to go downstairs and venture into the Invisible Thread. She sat quietly behind the counter with Song Lee, seeing more people in one day than she'd seen in months back on the farm. Li was amazed at how efficiently her sister ran the business. Including Song Lee, she had four women working for her. The seamstresses worked upstairs and laughed and talked as they mended. Whenever Li offered to help, Pei insisted she take it easy for a little while longer.