Shanghai Girls Read online

  We’d talked about where the baby could be born and had settled on the showers as the one place where the other women were most afraid to venture. Even so, women sometimes took showers during the day. “I won’t let the baby come out then,” May had promised.

  Now, thinking back on it, I realize that May has probably been in labor most of the day, resting on her bunk, her knees up, her legs crossed, keeping the baby inside.

  “When did the pains start? How long between them?” I ask, remembering that these are clues to how much longer it will be until the baby breathes air.

  “They started this morning. They weren’t so bad, and I knew I had to wait. Suddenly, I started feeling like I needed to use the toilet. The water came out when I came in here.”

  That has to be the water soaking my feet and knees.

  She clutches my hand when a contraction grips her. Her eyes shut and her face reddens as she swallows her agony. She squeezes my hand, digging her nails into my palm so deeply that I’m the one who wants to scream. When the contraction ends, she takes a breath and her hand relaxes in mine. An hour later, I see the top of the baby’s head.

  “Do you think you can squat?” I ask.

  May whimpers in response. I get behind her and pull her to a wall so she can prop herself against it. I get between her legs. I clasp my hands before me and close my eyes to gather my courage. I open my eyes, look into my sister’s pained face, and try to put as much conviction as I can into my voice as I repeat to her what she’s said to me so many times these past weeks. “We can do this, May. I know we can.”

  When the baby slips out, it isn’t the son that we talked about. It’s a wet, mucus-covered girl—my daughter. She’s tiny, even smaller than I expected. She doesn’t cry. Instead, she makes little sounds like the plaintive calls of a baby bird.

  “Let me see.”

  I blink and look at my sister. Her hair hangs in wet strings, but all traces of pain have faded from her face. I hand her the baby and stand.

  “I’ll be right back,” I say, but May isn’t listening to me. She’s wrapped her arms around the baby, protecting it from the shock of cold air and wiping away the goo from its face with her sleeve. I stare at them for a moment. This is all the time they’ll have together before I take the baby for my own.

  As quickly and quietly as I can, I scurry back to the dormitory. I pull out one of the outfits May and I made, a ball of yarn, a small pair of scissors the missionary ladies gave us to help with our handiwork projects, some sanitary supplies, and two towels we bought from the concession stand. I grab the teapot from atop the radiator and hurry back to the showers. By the time I get there, May has expelled the afterbirth. I tie yarn around the umbilical cord and cut it. Then I dampen one end of the clean towel with hot water from the teapot and hand it to May to clean the baby. I use some of the water and the other towel to clean May. The baby was small, so the tearing isn’t all that bad compared with what happened to me down in that area. I hope she’ll heal without stitches. But in truth, what else can I do? I barely know how to sew a seam. How can I stitch my sister’s private parts?

  While May dresses the baby, I wipe the floor and wrap the afterbirth in the towels. When everything’s as clean as I can make it, I stuff the soiled things in the trash.

  Outside the sky turns pink. We don’t have much time.

  “I don’t think I can get up by myself,” May says from the floor. Her pale legs tremble from cold and the exertion she’s been through. She scoots away from the wall, and I lift her to her feet. Blood trickles down her legs and spots the floor.

  “Don’t worry,” she says. “Don’t worry. Here. Take her.”

  She gives me the baby. I forgot to bring the blanket May knit, and the baby’s arms jerk awkwardly in their sudden freedom. I haven’t carried her inside me all these months, but I instantly love her as my own. I hardly pay attention to May as she puts a belt and napkin in place and pulls on her underwear and pants.

  “I’m ready,” she says.

  We look around the room. It won’t be a secret that a woman gave birth here. What matters is that no one suspect it was anything out of the ordinary, because I won’t be able to be examined by the station’s doctors.

  I’M PROPPED IN bed, holding my daughter, with May nestled beside me—dozing lightly, her head on my shoulder—when the other women rise. It takes a while before anyone notices us.

  “Aiya! Look who’s come in the night!” Lee-shee squeals excitedly.

  The other women and their small children gather around, gently pushing against one another to get a better look.

  “Your son arrived!”

  “No son. A daughter,” May corrects. Her voice sounds so dreamy from exhaustion that for a second I worry she’ll give us away.

  “A little happiness,” Lee-shee says sympathetically, using the traditional phrase to convey the disappointment in the birth of a girl. Then she grins. “But look around. Almost everyone here is a woman, except for the little boys who need their mothers. We must look at this as an auspicious occurrence.”

  “It won’t remain auspicious if the baby stays dressed like that,” one of the women says forebodingly.

  I look at the baby. Her clothes are the first May and I ever made. The buttons are crooked and the knit hat is lopsided, but apparently these aren’t the problems. The baby needs to be protected from bad elements. The women go away and return with gifts of coins to represent the care of “one hundred friends of the family.” Someone ties a red string in her black hair to give her luck. Then, one after the other, the women sew tiny charms depicting the animals of the zodiac onto her hat and the other clothes we made to protect her from evil spirits, bad omens, and sickness.

  A collection is taken up, and someone is elected to give the money to one of the Chinese cooks to make a bowl of mother’s soup of pickled pigs’ feet, ginger, peanuts, and whatever hard liquor he can find. (Shaohsing wine is best, but whiskey will do if that’s all he has.) A new mother is depleted and suffers from too much cold yin. Most of the soup’s ingredients are considered hot and builders of yang. I’m told they will help shrink my womb, rid my body of stagnant blood, and bring in my milk.

  Suddenly, one of the women reaches over and starts to unbutton my jacket. “You’ve got to feed the baby. We’ll show you how.”

  I gently push away her hand.

  “We’re in America now, and my daughter is an American citizen. I will do as the Americans do.” And modern Shanghainese women too, I think, remembering all the times May and I modeled for companies advertising powdered baby milk. “She will have baby formula.”

  As usual, I translate the exchange from Sze Yup into the Wu dialect so May will understand.

  “Tell her the bottles and the formula are in a package under the bed,” May rattles off quickly. “Tell her I don’t want to leave you, but if one of them could help us, I’d be grateful.”

  While one of the women takes a bottle and mixes some of the powdered formula we bought from the concession stand with water from the teapot and places it on the windowsill to cool, Lee-shee and the others discuss the problem of the baby’s name.

  “Confucius said that if names are not correct, then language and society are not in accordance with the truth of things,” she explains. “The child’s grandfather or someone of great distinction needs to name your baby.” She purses her lips, looks around, and observes theatrically, “But I don’t see anyone around here like that. Perhaps it’s just as well. You have a daughter. Such a disappointment! You wouldn’t want her to be named Flea, That Dog, or Dustpan, like my father named me.”

  Naming is important, but it doesn’t belong to women. Now that we have the opportunity to name a child—a girl at that—we find it’s a lot harder than it seems. We can’t name the girl after my mother or even use our family name as her given name to honor my father, because these options are considered taboo. We can’t name her after a heroine or goddess either, because that’s presumptuous and disrespectf
ul.

  “I like Jade, because it conveys strength and beauty,” suggests a young detainee.

  “The flower names are pretty. Orchid, Lily, Iris—”

  “Oh, but they’re such common names and too frail,” Lee-shee objects. “Look where this baby was born. Shouldn’t she be named something like Mei Gwok?”

  Mei Gwok means Beautiful Country, which is the official Cantonese name for the United States, but it doesn’t sound melodious or pretty.

  “You can’t go wrong using a two-character generational name,” another woman offers. This appeals to me, since May and I share the generational name Long—Dragon. “You could use De—Virtue—as the base and then name each daughter Kind Virtue, Moon Virtue, Wise Virtue—”

  “Too much trouble!” Lee-shee exclaims. “I named my daughters Girl One, Girl Two, Girl Three. My sons are Son One, Son Two, Son Three. Their cousins are Cousins Seven, Eight, Nine, Ten, and so on. Giving numbers reminds everyone where a child fits in the family.”

  What she leaves unsaid is, Who wants to be bothered with names when too often children die? I don’t know how much of this May follows or how much she understands, but when she speaks the others quiet.

  “Only one name is right for this baby,” May says in English. “She should be called Joy. We’re in America now. Let’s not burden her with the past.”

  When May moves her head to look up at me, I realize that all this time she’s been staring at the baby. Even though I cradle Joy, May has managed to be physically closer to her than I have. She draws herself up, reaches around her neck, and takes off the pouch with the three coppers, three sesame seeds, and three green beans Mama gave her to keep her safe. My hand goes to the pouch I still wear. I don’t believe it protected me, but I still wear it and the jade bracelet as physical reminders of my mother. May places the leather string around Joy’s head and tucks the pouch inside her clothes.

  “To keep you safe wherever you go,” May whispers.

  The women around us weep at the beauty of her words and gesture, calling her a good auntie, but we all know this gift will be taken off Joy to keep her from strangling.

  When the missionary ladies come, I refuse to let them escort me to the station’s hospital. “It’s not the Chinese way,” I say. “But if you could send a telegram to my husband, I would be most grateful.”

  The message is short and to the point: MAY AND PEARL ARRIVED ANGEL ISLAND. SEND TRAVEL FUNDS. BABY BORN. PREPARE ONE-MONTH BIRTHDAY.

  That night, the women return from dinner with the special mother’s soup. Over the objections of the women who cluster around, I share the soup with my sister, saying that she worked as hard as I did. They tsk-tsk and shake their heads, but May needs the soup far more than I do.

  CHAIRMAN PLUMB IS thoroughly stumped when I walk into my next hearing wearing one of my prettiest silk dresses and my hat with the feathers—with the coaching book well studied by both May and me hidden inside the lining—speaking perfect English and carrying a baby decorated with charms. I answer every question correctly and without hesitation, knowing that in another room May is doing the exact same thing. But my actions and those of May are irrelevant, as is the whole legally domiciled merchant/wife of an American citizen question. What are the officials going to do with this baby? Angel Island is part of the United States, yet no one’s citizenship or status is acknowledged until that person leaves the island. It’s easier for the officials to release us than for them to deal with the bureaucratic problems Joy presents.

  Chairman Plumb gives his usual synopsis at the end of the interrogation, but he’s hardly happy when he comes to his concluding words: “The submission of this case has been delayed for over four months. While it is clear that this woman has spent very little time with her husband, who claims to be an American citizen, she has now given birth at our station. After considerable deliberation, we have come to agreement on the essential points. I therefore move that Louie Chin-shee be admitted to the United States as the wife of an American citizen.”

  “I concur,” Mr. White says.

  “I also concur,” the recorder says in the first and only time I hear him speak.

  At four that same afternoon, the guard comes in and calls two names: Louie Chin-shee and Louie Chin-shee—May’s and my old-fashioned married names. “Sai gaai,” he announces loudly in his usual mangling of the phrase that means good fortune. We’re handed our Certificates of Identity. I’m given a United States birth certificate for Joy, stating that she is “too small to be measured”—which means only that they didn’t bother to examine her. I hope these words will be useful in erasing any suspicions about dates and Joy’s size when Old Man Louie and Sam see her. The other women help us pack our things. Lee-shee weeps when she says good-bye. May and I watch the guard lock the dormitory door behind us, and then we follow him out of the building and down the path to the dock, where we pick up the rest of our luggage and board the ferry to take us to San Francisco.

  A Single Rice Kernel

  WE PAY FOURTEEN dollars to take the Harvard steamship to San Pedro. On the voyage, having learned our lesson at Angel Island, we rehearse our stories for why we missed the ship all those months ago, how hard we tried to get out of China to come to our husbands, and how difficult our interrogations were. But we don’t need to tell any stories, real or otherwise. When Sam meets us at the dock, he says simply, “We thought you were dead.”

  We’ve seen each other only three times: in the Old Chinese City, at our wedding, and when he gave me our tickets and other traveling papers. After Sam’s single sentence, he stares at me wordlessly. I look at him wordlessly. May hangs back, carrying our two bags. The baby sleeps in my arms. I don’t expect hugs or kisses, and I don’t expect him to acknowledge Joy in an extravagant way. That would be inappropriate. Still, our meeting after all this time is very awkward.

  On the streetcar, May and I sit behind Sam. This is not a city of “magical tall buildings” like the ones we had in Shanghai. Eventually, I see one white tower to my left. After a few more blocks, Sam gets up and motions to us. Outside the window to the right is a huge construction zone. To the left stands a long block of two-story brick buildings, some of which have signs in Chinese. The streetcar stops, and we get off We walk up and around the block. A sign reads LOS ANGELES STREET. We cross the street, skirt a plaza with a bandstand in the center, walk past a firehouse, and then make a left down Sanchez Alley, which is lined by more brick buildings. We step through a door with the words GARNIER BLOCK carved above it, walk down a dark passageway, climb a flight of old wooden stairs, and wend our way along a musty corridor that reeks of cooked food and dirty diapers. Sam hesitates before the door to the apartment he shares with his parents and Vern. He turns and gives May and me a look that I read as sympathy. Then he opens the door and we enter.

  The first thing that strikes me is just how poor, dirty, and shabby everything is. A couch covered in stained mauve material leans glumly against a wall. A table with six wooden chairs of no particular design or craftsmanship takes up space in the center of the room. Next to the table, not even tucked into a corner, sits a spittoon. A quick glance shows that it hasn’t been emptied recently. No photographs, paintings, or calendars hang on the walls. The windows are filthy and without coverings. From where I stand just inside the front door I can see into the kitchen, which is little more than a counter with some appliances on it and a niche for the worship of the Louie family ancestors.

  A short, round woman with her hair pinned into a small bun at the back of her neck rushes to us, squealing in Sze Yup. “Welcome! Welcome! You’re here!” Then she calls over her shoulder. “They’re here! They’re here!” She flicks her wrist at Sam. “Go get the old man and my boy.” As Sam slumps through the main room and down a hall, she turns her attention back to us. “Let me have the baby! Oh, let me see! Let me see! I’m your yen-yen,” she trills to Joy, using the Sze Yup diminutive for grandmother. Then to May and me, she adds, “You can call me Yen-yen too.”
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  Our mother-in-law is older than I expected, given that Vernon is just fourteen. She looks like she’s in her late fifties—ancient compared with Mama, who was thirty-eight when she died.

  “I am the one who will see the child” comes a stern voice, also speaking in Sze Yup. “Give it here.”

  Old Man Louie, dressed in a long mandarin robe, enters the room with Vern, who hasn’t grown much since we last saw him. Again, May and I expect questions about where we’ve been and why it took so long to get here, but the old man has no interest in us whatsoever. I hand Joy to him. He sets her on a table and roughly undresses her. She begins to cry—alarmed by his bony fingers, her grandmother’s exclamations, the hardness of the table against her back, and the sudden shock of being naked.

  When Old Man Louie sees she’s a girl, his hands draw back. Distaste wrinkles his features. “You didn’t write that the child is a girl. You should have done that. We wouldn’t have prepared a banquet if we’d known.”

  “Of course she needs a one-month party,” my mother-in-law chirps. “Every baby—even a girl—needs a one-month party. Anyway, no going back now. Everyone is coming.”

  “You’ve planned something already?” May asks.

  “Now!” Yen-yen rings out. “You took longer to get here from the harbor than we thought. Everyone is waiting at the restaurant.”

  “Now?” May echoes.

  “Now!”

  “Shouldn’t we change?” May asks.

  Old Man Louie scowls. “No time for that. You don’t need anything. You’re not so special now. No need to try to sell yourselves here.”

  If I were braver, I’d ask why he’s so deliberately rude and mean, but we haven’t even been in his home ten minutes.

  “She will need a name,” Old Man Louie says, nodding to the baby.

  “Her name is Joy,” I say.