cleaner they use here in China, the one that smells like acrid, perfumed kerosene.
I work here a few shifts a week. That’s plenty.
I don’t mean British John’s a bad guy. He’s not. He’s hinted about hiring me to run this place so he can start another business, making me legal and getting me a work visa, which god knows I need.
But doing this?
‘And my heart will go on and on!’
I duck behind the bar, pour myself a beer, and swallow a Percocet.
Between pouring drafts and mixing drinks, I think about what happened in Mati Village.
Lao Zhang has to be in some kind of trouble, but what? The central government doesn’t care much about what anybody does, as long as they don’t challenge the government’s authority. Lao Zhang’s not political, so far as I know. He doesn’t talk about overthrowing the CCP or democracy or freedom of speech. Nothing like that. He talks about living a creative life, about building communities to support that, places that encourage each individual’s expression and value their labors – the opposite of the factories and malls and McJobs that treat people like trash and throw them away whenever they feel like it.
Maybe that’s close enough to freedom of speech to get him in trouble.
But why am I in trouble?
You’re a foreigner, you cause problems, usually they just kick you out of China. Which, if I don’t get my act together, is going to happen anyway.
He told me not to go home tonight.
Maybe it’s not the government, I think. Maybe it’s gangsters. Or some local official Lao Zhang pissed off. A back-door deal gone wrong.
And then there’s Lucy Wu. Ex-girlfriend? Undercover Public Security Officer?
He should have told me what was going on.
My leg hurts like a motherfucker, even with the Percocet, so I start drinking Guinness, and I end up hanging out in the bar after we close, drinking more Guinness with British John, his Chinese wife Xiaowei, an Australian named Hank, and two Norwegian girls. One of them, the taller of the two who looks like a supermodel, is a bitch. She keeps going on about the evils of American imperialism. ‘It was American imperial aggression that created the desire for a Caliphate,’ and ‘The Taliban was a predictable response to American imperial aggression.’
British John keeps giving me looks, like he thinks I’m going to lose it.
‘Hey, we need more music,’ Xiaowei pipes up. ‘What should I play?’
‘You choose, luv,’ says British John. ‘As long as it’s none of that fucking awful Korean pop.’
Xiaowei pouts. She loves Korean pop, which as British John points out, really is fucking awful.
‘Reggae!’ shouts Hank the Australian.
‘It was America’s criminal invasion of Iraq,’ the Norwegian chick drones on. She’s kind of drunk by now, too. ‘Everyone involved is a criminal. You know, Falluja, Haditha, Abu Ghraib, these are war crimes …’
Hank and the other Norwegian girl, meanwhile, have gone over to the jukebox, draped over each other like partners in a three-legged race. ‘Redemption Song’ booms over the speakers.
‘These soldiers, they killed innocents, and you Americans call them heroes.’
‘Why don’t you just shut the fuck up?’ I finally say. I’m not mad. I’m just tired. ‘You Norwegians are sitting on top of all that North Sea oil or you’d be making deals and screwing people like everyone else. Plus, you kill whales.’
Supermodel straightens up. Actually, she looks more like a Viking. All she needs is a spear. ‘Norway contributes more percentage of its income to foreign aid than any other country. While you Americans –’
‘Oh, it’s wrong to kill whales,’ Xiaowei says, her eyes filling with tears. ‘And dolphins. They are so smart! I think they are smarter than we are.’
‘Darts, anyone?’ British John asks.
I end up crashing at British John and Xiaowei’s place, finally dragging myself off their couch the next day around noon to make my way home.
Of course, I run into Mrs Hua, who is hustling her kid into their apartment, him clutching an overstuffed, greasy bag of Mickey D’s.
‘Somebody looking for you,’ she hisses, her little raisin eyes glittering in triumph. ‘You in some kind of trouble!’
I roll my eyes. ‘Yeah, right.’
‘Foreigners,’ she continues. ‘In suits! You in trouble.’
I freeze, but only for a moment.
‘Whatever.’
I unlock the door and make my way through the living room, which is cluttered with all kinds of random stuff: books, magazines, dirty clothes, a guitar amp, and a cardboard standup figure of Yao Ming draped with a plastic lei. My roommate Chuckie has the blackout curtains drawn, and I can hardly see a thing, just Yao Ming, the red of his jersey blanched gray by the dark.
Foreigners in suits. It doesn’t make sense. How can Lao Zhang be in trouble with foreigners in suits?
Then I think: maybe it’s not Lao Zhang they’re looking for.
I’m not in trouble, I tell myself. I’m not. All that shit happened a long time ago, and nobody cares about it any more.
‘Cao dan! Zhen ta ma de!’
‘Chuckie? What?’
Chuckie bursts out of his bedroom, greasy hair bristling up in spikes, glasses askew, Bill Gates T-shirt about three sizes too big, knobby knees sticking out beneath dirty gym shorts.
‘That fucking bastard stole my seventh-level Qi sword!’
‘I’m sorry to hear it,’ I say. ‘Who stole your sword?’
‘Ming Lu, the little shits! I should go bust his damn balls!’
I try to picture Chuckie busting much of anything and fail. The reason I have such a good deal renting this apartment is that Chuckie gives me a break in exchange for tutoring him in English conversation. Sometimes I listen to him and think that I’m not really doing my job.
‘So … Chuckie … I don’t understand. This sword, I mean, it’s not a real sword, is it? It’s like … it’s part of the game, right?’
Chuckie stares at me like I’ve suddenly grown horns.
‘Of course it’s part of the game!’
‘So, um … if it’s not real, how did Ming Lu steal it?’
Chuckie paces around the dim, dank apartment, which I notice smells like some weird combination of sour beer and cement dust. ‘I lend it to
