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James is all too familiar with this kind of forgetfulness. From Lloyd College to Harvard to Midwood, he felt it every day—first a brief moment of calmness, and then as if someone poked you in the ribs, reminding you of your incompatibility with the environment. He felt that this was a false comfort, like a zoo animal lying in a cage, trying its best to ignore the onlookers and pretending that it was still running free in the wild. Now, a month had passed since Lydia's funeral, but he cherished those forgotten moments.
Others would have sought relief in whiskey, vodka or beer, but James never liked the taste of alcohol, nor did he feel that alcohol could numb his nerves; alcohol would only turn him crimson - as if he had been beaten hard. After a while, his brain was spinning wildly. He took a long drive, taking various angles through Midwood and along the highway to the outskirts of Cleveland before turning around. He takes sleeping pills, and even in his dreams, Lydia is dead. One place he found it hard not to think about, over and over again, was Louisa's bed.
He told Marilyn that he had to go to class or meet with students; on weekends, he said he would go back to school to grade papers. None of this is true. A week after Lydia's death, the department chair canceled all of his summer classes. "Take some time for yourself, James." He patted James on the shoulder kindly. Department chairs do this whenever they need to appease someone—a student who is furious because they got a low grade, a faculty member who is not receiving benefits. His job is to calm things down. But even then, those students will never turn their C-minus into a B; the incoming grant will never turn into actual benefits. You never get what you want; you just learn how to get by. The last thing James wanted was time to himself—staying at home was unbearable. Every moment he expected Lydia to be in the hallway, or to hear the creak of the floorboards in her room above. One morning, he heard footsteps in Lydia's room and rushed upstairs without thinking. He found Marilyn pacing in front of Lydia's desk, opening and closing all her drawers. "Get out." He wanted to shout like this, as if this was a holy place. Now, every morning he picks up his briefcase and drives to school like he usually does. In the office, he would unconsciously stare at the family photo on the table. In the photo, Lydia—not yet fifteen years old—looked at him, as if she could jump out of the frame at any moment and leave the others behind. In the afternoons he would go to Luisa's apartment and fall between her arms, then her legs, where his mind would fall into a blissful blankness.
However, leaving Louisa's house, he will think of everything again, and even become angrier than before. One night, as he walked to his car, he picked up an empty bottle on the side of the road and threw it at the apartment building where Louisa lived. Sometimes he would drive his car toward a tree in a fight with rage. Nath and Hannah avoided him as much as possible, and he and Marilyn sometimes went weeks at a time without speaking. The Fourth of July was approaching, and James passed by the lake and noticed that the pier was decorated with colorful flags and red and white balloons. He ran over and pulled down all the colorful flags and burst the balloons one by one. When all the decorations sank into the lake and the entire pier seemed sparse and desolate, he returned home tremblingly.
He would also get angry when he saw Nath looking through the refrigerator. "You're wasting electricity," James said. Nath closed the refrigerator door, his quiet resignation only making James angrier: "Why do you always get in the way?"
"I'm sorry." Nas said, holding a hard-boiled egg in one hand and a napkin in the other. "I didn't expect it was you." James remembered that when he got out of the car, his breath was mixed with car exhaust and engine oil. As he smelled the air, he suddenly realized that he could smell Louisa's perfume on his skin—a musky and sweet mixture that he suspected Nath could smell too.
"What do you mean, you didn't expect it to be me?" he said. "After working all day, don't I have the right to enter my own kitchen?" He put down his bag, "Where is your mother?"
"In Lydia's room," Nest paused, "she's been in there all day."
Under his son's gaze, James felt a sharp stabbing pain coming from the middle of his shoulder blades, as if Nath was accusing him.
"You'd better know," he said, "I have a very heavy summer course and several meetings." He blushed at the memory of that afternoon - Louisa knelt in front of his chair and slowly pulled away His trouser chain—and the blush made him angry. Nath stared at him, his lips slightly pursed, as if he wanted to ask a question, but couldn't. James was suddenly furious because, ever since becoming a father, James had always felt that Lydia was like her mother—beautiful, blue-eyed, and steady—while Nath was like him, melancholic and hesitant in speech. Most of the time, he forgot about the fact that Lydia and Nath also looked alike. Now, he suddenly found Lydia's shadow on Ness's face: big eyes and quiet personality. Thinking of this, he became more and more unbearable: "You stay at home all day, don't you have any friends?"
His father had said this for years, but this time, Nath felt something snap, like an overstretched thread. "No, I'm not like you. I don't have to... have a meeting." He wrinkled his nose, "You smell like perfume. You have a meeting, right?"
James grabbed his son's shoulders so hard that his knuckles cracked. "You're not allowed to talk to me like that," he said. "You're not allowed to ask me that. You don't know my life." Then, without thinking, he blurted out, "Just like you don't know your sister's life."
Nath's expression did not change, but his entire face was stiff, as if he was wearing a mask. James wanted to catch the moth he just said, but those words had already penetrated his son's ears. He could see it in Nath's eyes, which had become cold and stiff, like glass. He wanted to reach out and touch his son—touch his hand, his shoulder, anywhere—to tell him that he didn't mean to do it, that this wasn't his son's fault. At this time, Ness punched the counter, creating a crack in the old countertop. He ran towards his room, stamping on the stairs. James' bag slipped to the floor, he leaned weakly on the counter, and his hand touched something cold and wet: a crushed hard-boiled egg. The sharp eggshell penetrated deeply into the soft egg white.
He had been thinking about this all night, and all he could see was his son's stiff face. The next morning, he got up early, took the newspaper from the porch, and saw the bold date on it: July 3rd. Lydia disappeared for two months. Two months ago, he was grading papers in the office and timidly helping Louisa catch the beetles on her head; two months ago, July 3rd was still a happy day, and it was still a day that had stayed with him for ten years. A day to cherish—this was the day Marilyn made her miraculous return. Things are really unpredictable. James went into the kitchen and took off the rubber band from the newspaper. Opening the newspaper, he saw a line of subtitles: "Teachers and Students Commemorate the Passed Girl." Recently, the articles about Lydia have become shorter and rarer, and soon they will disappear completely, and everyone will forget about her as a person. James held up the newspaper. It was overcast outside, but he didn't turn on the light, as if the dim light would soften what he was about to read. Karen Adler said: She seemed quite lonely, she didn't interact with anyone. Pam Sanders said: She didn't have many friends, not even a boyfriend. I don't think boys pay any attention to her. At the bottom, Lee’s physics teacher Donald Kelly recalled: She was a lonely freshman in high school taking a sophomore physics class. Kelly said: "She studies hard, but she obviously doesn't fit in." There is a supplementary report next to the article: Children from mixed-race family backgrounds often have difficulty finding their own place.
Then, the phone rang. Every time he heard the phone ring, his first thought was: They found her. A small part of him thought that the police must have discovered that they had made a mistake and mistook someone for Lydia, so he was just having a bad dream. The rest of him would put on a more sensible stance and say: You've seen her. Then he would once again think painfully and clearly of his daughter's swollen hands and pale face.
So when he answered the phone, his voice always trembled.
"Mr. Li," it was Officer Fisk calling, "I hope it's not too early to call you. How did you feel this morning?"
"Not bad." James said. Everyone will ask this, so now he will automatically tell a lie.
"Okay, Mr. Lee," Officer Fisk said. James realized he was about to break the bad news. No one would call your name so solemnly except to show affection. "I want to inform you that we have decided to close the case. We have determined this case to be a suicide."
James felt he had to repeat the words to understand their meaning: "Suicide?"
Officer Fisk paused and said, "Police work isn't always flawless, Mr. Lee, but I hope not. This isn't a movie—it's hard to tell clearly." He didn't like to announce bad news and could only keep things business-like. "According to the circumstances at the scene, suicide is the most likely possibility. There is no evidence that the deceased was tortured. Moreover, she was withdrawn, her grades were declining, and she went to the lake knowing that she could not swim," he said.
James lowered his head and Officer Fisk continued, his tone gentler, like a father comforting a young child: "We know this news is difficult for you and your family to accept, Mr. Lee, but we hope it is at least It can help you get out of the shadows.”
"Thank you." James put down the receiver. Behind him, Marilyn came quietly from the corridor, holding her hand on the doorframe.
"Who was it just now?" she asked. Judging by the way she was clutching the front of her nightgown, James knew she had heard every word. Marilyn pressed the light switch, and the sudden light made him feel very dazzling.
"They can't close the case," Marilyn said. "The real murderer hasn't been caught yet."
"The murderer? The police think..." James paused, "They think no one else was involved in this matter."
"They don't know her. Someone must have taken her there and tricked her." Marilyn said vaguely. Cigarettes and condoms came to her mind, but anger swept them aside, prompting her to scream. She shouted, "She won't slip out on her own. Don't you think I don't understand my daughter?"
James didn't answer. He had only one thought: If only we hadn't moved here, if only she had never seen the lake. The silence and alienation between the two gradually developed into a thick layer of ice, and Marilyn had a cold war.
"You believed them, didn't you?" she said. "You thought it was her decision." She couldn't say the word "suicide"; the mere thought of it made her seething with rage. Lydia would never treat her family like this, especially her mother. How could James believe them? "They just want to close the case because it's the easiest way," Marilyn said tremblingly, clasping her hands as if doing so would calm the tremors in her heart. "If she had been a white girl, they would have investigated it."
James felt as if a big rock had been smashed into his stomach. Since their marriage, white has simply been the color of paper, the color of snow, and the color of sugar. China - if the word must be mentioned - can only be associated with chess, some kind of fire drill and Chinese takeout. Just as the earth revolves around the sun, it is natural not to talk too much about these words. James had naively believed—contrary to what Marilyn’s mother and others believed—that Marilyn treated people of all races equally. Now, the words coming out of Marilyn's mouth—if she were a white girl—confirmed what James had always feared: Deep down, she still labeled everything. White people and non-white people, it’s these labels that change the world beyond recognition.
"If she had been a white girl," he said, "none of this would have happened."
Marilyn was still angry with the police. She didn't understand what James said, and her confusion deepened her anger. "What do you mean?" Under the kitchen light, her wrists looked pale and thin, her lips were dull, and her face was cold. James remembered that long ago, when they were young, the most terrifying thing imaginable was not being able to be together. Once, he reached out and touched her back, and she felt that the hairs on her shoulder blades stood up, and his fingers seemed to be carrying electricity. Now, those moments are gone forever and everything feels like a lifetime ago.
"You know what I mean, if she had been a white girl..." he said bitterly, if she had been a white girl, if I had been white, "she would have fit in."
He realized that moving to Midwood was no reason because it would be the same everywhere. Children from mixed-race family backgrounds often have difficulty finding their place. Therefore, this mistake is older, deeper, and more fundamental. It happened on the morning of their wedding, when the magistrate looked at Marilyn and she said, "I do." Or that first afternoon they spent together, when he stood beside the bed, naked and shy, and she wrapped her legs around his waist and pulled him towards her. Even earlier, the moment she kissed him across the table, it was like a perfectly placed punch that took his breath away. All in all, there are a million tiny possibilities to change the future. They shouldn't have gotten married, he shouldn't have touched her, and she should have turned around and left his office. He has completely understood that none of this should have happened, it was all a mistake.
"Your mother was right," he said, "you should marry someone more like you."
Before Marilyn could say anything—before she had time to discern whether she was feeling angry, sad, or hurt, before she really understood what James meant—he was out.
This time, he didn't drive to school first, but came directly to Louisa's place. He ran through countless red lights and ran up the stairs panting as if he had run. "Are you okay?" she asked as she opened the door. She smelled like she had just taken a shower. Although she was dressed, her hair was not wiped and she still had a comb in her hand. It was only a quarter past nine in the morning, and from her surprised tone, James heard the implication: Is he here to stay? What about his wife? He didn't know the answers to these questions either. He finally said to Marilyn what he had been holding in his heart for a long time. He felt a strange sense of relief. He felt that the room in front of him was shaking and spinning, and he fell down on the sofa.
"You have to eat something." After Luisa said that, she walked into the kitchen and took out a small crisper, "Here you go." She gently opened the lid of the box and pushed the box in front of his eyes. Inside were three snow-white snacks. The wrinkles on the surface were like peony balls in bud, revealing a bit of the reddish-brown filling inside. The sweet smell of roast pork drifted into his nostrils.
"I made these yesterday," Luisa said and paused, "Do you know what they are?"
His mother had made this kind of food before, in the cramped, dark little apartment where they lived. She roasted the pork first, wrapped it in dough, made folds on it, and steamed it in a bamboo basket she bought from China. This snack was his father's favorite and was called "barbecued pork buns."
Louisa smiled. Only then did James realize that he had just spoken their names out loud. He hadn't spoken Chinese in forty years, but his tongue could still curl into its familiar shape. He has never eaten barbecued pork buns since he grew up. His mother once asked him to take it to school for lunch, but he refused, preferring to eat the same thing as the other children. "Come on," said Luisa, "have a taste."