Do Not Say We Have Nothing: A Novel Read Free Page B

falling hard, and she walked with her head down, holding a medium-sized suitcase that appeared to be empty. She was pale and her hair had the gleam of the sea.
    Casually I opened the door and widened my eyes as if I was not expecting visitors.
    “Girl,” Ma said. “Take the suitcase. Hurry up.”
    Ai-ming stepped inside and paused on the edge of the doormat. When I reached for the suitcase, my hand accidentally touched hers, but she didn’t draw back. Instead, her other hand reached out and lightly covered mine. She gazed right at me, with such openness and curiosity that, out of shyness, I closed my eyes.
    “Ai-ming,” Ma was saying. “Let me introduce you. This is my Girl.”
    I pulled away and opened my eyes again.
    Ma, taking off her coat, glanced first at me and then at the room. The brown sofa with its three camel-coloured stripes had seen better days, but I had spruced it up with all the flowery pillows and stuffed animals from my bed. I had also turned on the television in order to give this room the appearance of liveliness. Ma nodded vigorously at me. “Girl, greet your aunt.”
    “Really, it’s okay if you call me Ai-ming. Please. I really, mmm, prefer it.”
    To placate them both, I said, “Hello.”
    Just as I suspected, the suitcase was very light. With my free hand, I moved to take Ai-ming’s coat, remembering too late she didn’t have one. My arm wavered in the air like a question mark. She reached out, grasped my hand and firmly shook it.
    She had a question in her eyes. Her hair, pinned back on one side, fell loosely on the other, so that she seemed forever in profile, about to turn towards me. Without letting go of my hand, she manoeuvred her shoes noiselessly off her feet, first one then the other. Pinpoints of rain glimmered on her scarf. Our lives had contracted to such a degree that I could not remember the last time a stranger had entered our home; Ai-ming’s presence madeeverything unfamiliar, as if the walls were crowding a few inches nearer to see her. The previous night, we had, at last, tidied Ba’s papers and notebooks, putting them into boxes and stacking the boxes under the kitchen table. Now I found the table’s surface deceitfully bare. I freed my hand, saying I would put the suitcase in her bedroom.
    Ma showed her around the apartment. I retreated to the sofa and pretended to watch the Weather Channel, which predicted rain for the rest of the week, the rest of 1990, the rest of the century, and even the remainder of all time. Their two voices ran one after the other like cable cars, interrupted now and then by silence. The intensity in the apartment crept inside me, and I had the sensation that the floor was made of paper, that there were words written everywhere I couldn’t read, and one unthinking gesture could crumple this whole place down.
    —
    We ate together, seated around the dining table. Ma had removed a leaf, transforming the table from an egg to a circle. She interrupted her own rambling to give me a look that said, Stop staring .
    Every now and then, my foot accidentally kicked one of the boxes under the table, causing Ai-ming to startle.
    “Ai-ming, do you mind the cold?” Ma said cheerily, ignoring me. “I myself never experienced winter until I came to Canada.”
    “Beijing has winter but I didn’t mind it. Actually, I grew up far away from there, in the South where it was humid and warm, and so when we moved to Beijing, the cold was new to me.”
    “I’ve never been to the capital, but I heard the dust flies in from the western deserts.”
    “It’s true.” Ai-ming nodded, smiling. “The dust would get into our clothes and hair, and even into our food.”
    Sitting directly across from her, I could see that she really was nineteen. Her eyes looked puffy and her expression reminded me, unexpectedly, of Ma’s grieving face. Sometimes, I think, you can look at a person and know they are full of words. Maybe the wordsare withheld due to pain or privacy,