The Dissident Read online

  “Sorry,” said Phil, whose hand was still clasping Mrs. Travers’s shoulder. “She was penned up for the whole flight. I was going to take her to a hotel, but it turns out they don’t accept pets. And then I just thought if I could come here and wait until a reasonable hour—and then I saw Mr.—”

  “Yuan,” Cece supplied. “Oh—I haven’t introduced you. This is Mr. Yuan, an artist whom we have the honor of hosting for the year.”

  I shook Uncle Phil’s hand, and then his niece’s—but Olivia was clearly more interested in the animal at our feet. She frowned and said something in French, which made Mrs. Travers and the uncle laugh. I had never studied any languages other than English, and a little bit of Russian as a child.

  “I was trying to bring you a present,” Uncle Phil said. “I guess I fucked it up, as usual.”

  “She’s just gorgeous,” Mrs. Travers knelt down. “Aren’t you? Aren’t you a gorgeous little monkey? Aren’t you a gorgeous little girl?”

  “She’s not a monkey,” Phil said.

  We all looked at Phil. It was hard to imagine what she was, if she was not a monkey.

  “She’s a bush baby.”

  “A bush baby!”

  “She’s from Namibia, originally. I bought her from a Chinese breeder in Queens.”

  “At the rare animal market!” Cece exclaimed. “Is that what you were doing that day?”

  I thought the uncle seemed embarrassed. “Some people say Flushing is New York’s real Chinatown.” He looked at me.

  “I’ve never been to New York,” I told him. I still felt a little annoyed about the way he’d failed to identify himself, putting me in an awkward position. At the time, the hypocrisy of this sentiment wasn’t clear to me.

  Both mother and daughter were crouched in front of the cage now, and although I was only looking at the bush baby, a type of animal I had never seen before, it was impossible not to notice that Cece’s towel had fallen open, and her generous cleavage was exposed. Her daughter might have noticed it too, since she suggested that the two of them go inside and change.

  “All right,” Cece said, standing up. “And then we’ll all have breakfast.”

  “I’m not sure I can stay,” Uncle Phil said, glancing at the house.

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” Cece said.

  “Too late,” said the uncle.

  Mrs. Travers only shook her head and smiled. “You must be exhausted.”

  “I might lie down in the pool house, just for a minute.”

  “Oh—” said Mrs. Travers uncomfortably, and I could see the problem. I could also see the solution to one of my problems, dropping right into my lap.

  “I will move my things.”

  “No,” Mrs. Travers said. “Absolutely not.”

  “It’s no trouble.”

  “That’s very kind,” Mrs. Travers said. “But Philip isn’t staying.”

  “No,” Phil agreed.

  “Really,” I said, “I insist.” But Mrs. Travers was firm. She thought that I was employing a particularly Chinese form of politeness: refusing what you want until it is forced upon you. Of course, in any country, politeness is often just a way of getting what you want.

  “I’m leaving anyway,” the uncle said. “I just wanted to drop off the bush baby.”

  “No!” Mrs. Travers and I said together. “You can at least stay for breakfast,” she added, turning to Olivia. “Honey, could you tell Lupe I need her help here?”

  Olivia started in the direction of the kitchen. Her mother looked at Phil, and then suddenly called after her. “Livy, honey? Sorry—I’ll talk to Lupe. You go tell Daddy that Phil is here.”

  Phil began to say something, but Mrs. Travers interrupted him.

  “We’ll have to keep her away from Salty and the cats—that’s the only problem. Unless you think she should be outside?”

  “Maybe in the pool house?” Phil said. “That is, if Mr. Yuan doesn’t mind.”

  Mrs. Travers shook her head. “The cats sleep in the pool house.”

  There was an awkward pause, in which I had my brilliant idea:

  “The problem is my allergy.”

  “You’re allergic to the bush baby?” Cece asked.

  “No one’s allergic to the bush baby,” Phil said. “She’s nonallergenic.”

  “I’m allergic to cats,” I told them. “So you see—”

  “More and more people are developing allergies,” the uncle contributed helpfully. “Because of all the carcinogens. It’s like an epidemic.”

  “Oh, no, why didn’t you say something?” Mrs. Travers looked genuinely distressed, and I felt sorry for lying. But there was no other option.

  “I am sorry to cause you so much trouble,” I said. “But perhaps that guest room?”

  “I guess that’s a possibility,” Mrs. Travers said. “There’s a back entrance, so at least you wouldn’t have to go trooping through Max’s room all the time.” At that moment, Olivia reappeared, followed, a moment later, by her father.

  “Gordo,” Phil said softly, although Dr. Travers was all the way across the lawn and could not hear him. “Long time, no see.”

  “Mom!” Olivia shouted: “Lupe wants to know, how many people for breakfast?”

  “At least stay a couple of hours,” Mrs. Travers said softly, as her husband and Olivia approached us across the large, very bright green lawn.

  The uncle protested, but with less conviction: “I just wanted to drop off Fionnula.”

  “Fionnula!” The name seemed to mean something to Mrs. Travers. Once again, I thought she would cry.

  “You can change her name if you want,” said Phil. “She’s yours now.”

  “No,” Mrs. Travers said. “Fionnula is perfect.”

  17.

  WHAT DID ONE WEAR TO MEET A DISSIDENT? JOAN HAD CHOSEN A LONG, gray silk skirt, a white T-shirt, and comfortable black sandals. Going through the scarves in her closet, she had found one with Chinese characters on it and cringed inwardly. From childhood she’d had the habit of inventing mortifying situations for herself and playing them out in her mind: Cece introducing her to the dissident, and Joan edging in to say, “Oh, hello. Did you notice my scarf? It’s Chinese! I thought I would wear it to night, and you could tell me what it means.”

  Even when she allowed herself very little time, Joan was always early. As she stood on Gordon and Cece’s doorstep, she admired again the yellow flowering trees along the curving driveway, the thick bougainvillea growing over the balcony, and the tiled eaves, casting sharp, rectilinear shadows on the house’s bright face. She wondered whether Gordon minded that the money had come from Cece. No matter how expertly he managed it (husbanded it, Joan thought) and no matter how much it increased (her brother’s investments had grown with an admirable steadiness throughout the 1990s) she knew Gordon would never forget that their fortune had begun with Cece’s capital.

  There were some ways in which she and her older brother were alike. They couldn’t stand to fail. Even to succeed wasn’t enough, if the success wasn’t spectacular. Both of them tended to diminish their own talents to others, not out of modesty but in order to make those strengths more brilliant when they did appear. Both of them liked to go through the proper channels, to jump through hoops; only then could their achievement be meaningful.

  There was thundering on the stairs inside the house, and then a voice calling, “I’ll get it.” Before he opened the door, she heard Max behind it: “Mom! Aunt Joan is here!”

  “Hello, Max.”

  “Hi,” Max said.

  She didn’t try to kiss him; she didn’t like kissing hellos, and she was pretty sure Max didn’t either. “How’s it going?”

  “People are in the yard. Having drinks.” Max made a face. “Even the children drink wine in France.”

  His imitation of his sister was good; Joan laughed. Immediately Max’s face darkened, as if he’d been tricked into something.

  “Joan? Is that you?” Cece hurried breathlessly across the living
room, holding a glass of champagne. She was wearing a white sundress with red and pink flowers splashed across it, a white sweater knotted over her shoulders, and sandals. The dress seemed to match the living room, carpeted and upholstered in white, with a red amaryllis in a crystal vase on the piano, beneath a drippy Diebenkorn horizon of pale pinks and greens.

  “You look wonderful,” Cece said. “How do you stay so skinny?”

  By worrying, Joan thought. “So do you,” she said.

  “My arms!” Cece looked genuinely horrified: “I just saw them in the bathroom—they’re all cottage cheesy. Like I am cottage cheese, not like I’ve been eating it. What could have possessed me to wear something sleeveless, do you think?” Cece put her glass down on the piano and embraced Joan. “I’m so glad you’re here,” she whispered. Then she stepped back, glancing behind her in a nervous way. Joan wondered if something had gone wrong with the dissident already. There were reasons that people didn’t just take strangers into their houses.

  “Is he here?”

  “Harry Lin? No, but I’m sure he’ll be here any minute.”

  “The dissident.”

  “Oh, yes,” Cece said. “He’s outside. Gordon is showing him the blight on the eugenia.”

  “Mom?” Max called from upstairs. He was hanging over the banister.

  “What is it, sweetie?”

  He seemed to be leaning dangerously far. “Can we eat now?”

  “We’re finishing our drinks,” Cece said. “I would love it if you would come downstairs and join our guests.”

  Joan wondered whom else Cece had invited. She planned to avoid being seated next to the eligible professor.

  “When can we then?”

  “If you can hang on for just a half an hour,” Cece began.

  The problem, Joan thought, was that Cece was too lenient. Often children who rebelled were just asking for more discipline. She had heard her brother say that parenting was all about treating children with respect; Joan sometimes wondered whether Max might want his parents to treat him with less respect.

  “A half an hour?”

  “I’m sorry,” Cece said. “If you come downstairs, you can ask Lupe for a glass of champagne. Just tell your father it’s ginger ale.”

  But Max was apparently not interested in socializing, even with the promise of alcohol; Joan heard his sullen footsteps retreating toward the back of the house—what Cece and Gordon referred to as the “children’s wing.”

  “Is everything OK?” Joan asked, as Cece rejoined her in the living room.

  “Fine,” Cece said. “Better than fine actually. Mr. Yuan is absolutely lovely.”

  “That’s good,” Joan said.

  Cece took a sip of champagne. She was getting up her courage.

  “What’s wrong?” Joan said.

  “You’re so perceptive. Because of what you do, I guess—or you do what you do because you’re perceptive? Were you always perceptive?”

  Joan would not allow herself to be steamrollered by flattery. “Cece?”

  Cece smiled weakly.

  “Is there something wrong with the dissident?”

  “Well, um, no—although he’s allergic to cats.”

  “That doesn’t seem insurmountable,” Joan said. “Maybe you should get rid of some of them.”

  Cece managed to nod agreeably, and at the same time dismiss that suggestion as ridiculous. “And so, of course, he can’t sleep in the pool house.”

  “Isn’t there a guest room upstairs?”

  Cece nodded: “That’s where he’s staying now, but it’s so small. He seemed to be just fine until yesterday, which makes me wonder—”

  “Mom?” Max called again.

  “For Christ’s sake, Max! Give us a minute!”

  It was extremely unusual to hear Cece yell at one of her children. Joan wondered if it was the champagne, although it was also unlike Cece to have more than one glass of anything at a time.

  Cece looked as if she’d surprised herself too. “I’m sorry,” she said to Joan. She went to the bottom of the stairs. “Max?”

  “Forget it.”

  “Max, please come down here.”

  Max came halfway down the stairs and stopped.

  “That’s better,” Cece said. “What is it?”

  “I was just wondering, since I have to stay home tonight—is Mr. Yuan staying upstairs?” He glanced at Joan, and then quickly away. “Or is Uncle Phil?”

  “What?” said Joan.

  “Max!” Cece’s ears were suddenly bright red. She turned to Joan, and as if blushes were communicable, like yawns, Joan felt her throat and her neck getting warm.

  “Phil is—” But there was no reason to continue. It was very clear from Cece’s expression, not to mention her dress and her heels, and the champagne cocktails, that Phil was here. He was right out in the backyard.

  “Go outside now,” Cece said to Max. “We’ll be out in a minute.”

  Cece’s voice was calm, but Joan could see a reflection of her anger in the shamed way that Max was picking at the varnish on the banister. He must’ve been told not to mention that his uncle was here when he answered the door. Gordon must’ve been occupying their younger brother in the backyard, while Cece did the delicate work of telling Joan. Why hadn’t they at least called to warn her?

  Cece descended the three steps into the living room, walking with the accommodating swivel that was natural to some women in heels, and not to others. She picked up her drink from the piano and ran one finger around the lip of the glass. “I wanted to say something before to night, but…”

  Joan couldn’t help herself. “You knew he was coming?”

  Cece looked shocked. “Joan—no. I swear. I tried to call you today, but your phone was turned off.”

  That was true, unfortunately. Joan liked to turn the ringer off while she was working (or trying to work), and she sometimes forgot to turn it on again.

  “I had a feeling, I guess,” Cece continued. “But he said he was in New York. He mentioned another woman,” Cece blushed and corrected herself: “Another woman besides his girlfriend, I mean. But then it didn’t turn out to be a woman at all!”

  “Who did it turn out to be?”

  “A monkey.”

  Joan looked at Cece.

  “Actually, she’s not a monkey: she’s a rare Namibian bush baby! He brought her as a present—isn’t that sweet?”

  “Just what you need.”

  Cece nodded. “We’ve never had anything like her.”

  “Where is Phil now?” Joan asked.

  Cece gestured toward the backyard. “He was eager to meet Mr. Yuan. Gordon and Livy are out there with them.”

  Probably Phil was doing research for a new play, on the subject of Chinese dissident painters. Or maybe her brother was so gifted that he didn’t need to do any research—probably he’d already sold the screenplay for a million dollars, while Joan had been reading student e-mail and staring at a blank screen.

  If she had known she was going to see her younger brother, Joan thought, she would’ve invented some recent accomplishment, or at least prepared the facts of her life into a more convincingly successful pattern. For example: she had published four books, was on the faculty of a respected college, owned a semi-valuable house in Cheviot Hills, and had been involved with two or three interesting men in the not-too-distant past. Or alternately: she was a divorced, middle-aged woman who taught in a correspondence writing program that she secretly despised in order to keep her health insurance.

  Cece was looking at Joan with a hopeful expression. “I’m so sorry,” she said. “I know your feelings about Phil are—lukewarm. But it’s OK, right? We can all have dinner? I’m so eager for you to meet Mr. Yuan, and Harry Lin should be here any minute.”

  Cece broke off as Gordon opened the sliding door. Behind him, bending slightly to compensate for his height, was her brother Phil, involved in an intense conversation with a person who could only be the dissident.

  18.<
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  YUAN ZHAO WAS A YOUNG MAN OF SLIGHT BUILD, WITH ROUND, JOHN Lennon–style glasses and a long, sleek ponytail. He was wearing a dark purple collarless Chinese shirt akin to the scarf Joan had rejected earlier, dark gray pajama pants, and black cloth slippers. Joan wondered if these were the kind of clothes he wore at home, or if he had bought them especially for Los Angeles. It was rare that someone corresponded so exactly to your image of him. In fact the dissident wasn’t what she’d been imagining, for exactly that reason.

  “I see,” Phil was saying. “But if the art scene went from zero to sixty like that, there must be a lot of junk too?” Her brother knew Joan was there, but he was going to finish his conversation with the dissident before he even looked at her. This was an old trick: Phil would wait several moments after he’d entered a room to make eye contact, a peculiarity that could seem pretentious, until you realized it was just a way for him to prepare. Her brother was one of those people who manage to transform their own awkwardness into a surprisingly successful social routine.

  “A lot of junk,” the dissident agreed. “More junk than not-junk.”

  Finally Gordon interrupted them: “Mr. Yuan, I’d like to introduce my sister, Joan.”

  Joan and the dissident shook hands. She was struck by the smoothness of his complexion, clean-shaven and unlined: he looked even younger than his photograph. She supposed that different people’s bodies responded differently to the sorts of extreme hardships Yuan Zhao had endured.

  Phil looked up, as if he’d just noticed her: “Joanie!” he exclaimed, and grinned. “Oops—do you still hate that?”

  “As ever,” Joan said.