Chairman Mao Would Not Be Amused – Fiction From Today by Howard Goldblatt (Editor) Page B

she went out. Would it kill you to stick around and pass up one chess match?"
    Old Lin sighs. "Shit, what's there to do on a day like this except play chess?" He sits down and arranges the pieces just to keep busy, and Hanli surprises him by sitting down across the table.
    "I'll play a game," Hanli says.
    "Don't be silly, you don't know how to play."
    "Sure I do. I learned by watching you."
    "All right." Old Lin reflects for a moment. "I'll hand over one of my pieces. What do you want, cart, horse, or cannon?"
    Hanli looks down at Old Lin's hands without answering. She's acting strange today.
    "You can have two carts and a cannon. What do you say?"
    "Up to you."
    Old Lin removes two carts and a cannon and lets Hanli open. But she just moves her vanguard cannon and stops. Obviously, her mind isn't on chess.
    "Papa, why don't you two sleep in the same room?"
    "Just play, and no foolish questions."
    "No. I want some answers."
    "She doesn't like me, and I don't like her, so why should we sleep in the same room?"
    "But I hear noises in her room at night."
    "She walks in her sleep. She's never been a sound sleeper."
    "No, I heard Old Shu from downstairs-"
    "Keep playing, and stop with all that nonsense."
    "Everyone says she and Old Shu-"
    "You're getting on my nerves!" He picks up a chess piece and bangs the board with it. "What you people do is your business."
    "What do you mean
our
business? It's your business, too. Do you know what people call you?"
    "Shut up! Now you're really getting on my nerves!" He stands up, grabs the chessboard, and dumps everything on Hanli. "You bastards won't let me live in peace!"
    Old Lin scoops up the broken umbrella and runs downstairs. Rain beating down on the sheet-metal roof has turned the dusk wet and forsaken. Hanli is on her knees, picking up the chess pieces, biting her lip to keep from crying out loud. She tries to figure out what's up with her father. What's up with this family? She can tell by the sound that the rain is picking up, and before long she fantasizes that it is about to innundate Fragrant Cedar Street. From where she sits on the floor, she feels as if the whole building were sinking. With darkness settling around her, she gets up to turn on the lights. Nothing happens, which scares her. Rushing over to the window to look downstairs, she sees Shu Gong poke his head out his window to pull in the line on which his blue underpants had been drying. Darkness claims Fragrant Cedar Street, all but a single bright spot on the crown of Shu Gong's head. Hanli runs downstairs, her flying feet making the stairway shake and creak. In the grip of a vaguely despairing thought, she hears her heart murmur, People should leave one another alone. I'll leave you alone, and you do the same for me.
    Hanli bursts into the little room in the Shu flat and plops breathlessly into a wicker chair. Shu Gong eyes her suspiciously. "Who's after you?"
    "Ghosts," Hanli says.
    "The electricity is out, probably a clowned wire."
    "It's not the dark I'm afraid of."
    "Then what is it?"
    "I'm not sure."
    "You don't have to be afraid of anything while I'm around." Unable to see Hanli's face in the darkness, Shu Gong grabs hold of the wicker chair and leans down to look more closely; but she turns away from him, the tip of her braid brushing his face.
    "People should leave one another alone," Hanli says. "I'm not going to get involved in their affairs anymore, and they'd better not get involved in mine."
    "Who's involved in whose affairs?" Shu Gong stops to ponder. "People should try to take care of themselves."
    "I'm not talking to you," Hanli says.
    "Then who are you talking to?" Shu Gong lifts a strand of her hair and tugs it.
    "To myself." She slaps at his hand but misses, which he finds exciting.
    "You're something, sure as hell." He yanks the hair out by its root. "It sure is long," he says, mesmerized by the strand of hair. "And really dark." A pulsating desire wraps itself around him; suddenly materializing, it