A Map for the Missing(7)

“Oh, I’m not sure about that . . .” She shook her hand and returned her gaze to her knees.

“You have an idea, Ma? I thought you said you didn’t.”

She flattened herself against the wall as she spoke, shy as a schoolgirl. “Well, I don’t know. But I was thinking, the only other place your father lived outside of the village was those army barracks. He used to talk about his life there so much. Maybe he wanted to go see it again, now that he was old. See how it might have changed.”

“Had he talked about going there recently?”

“Not going there, but he did tell the old stories. He was always telling them.”

“I heard that place closed down now,” Second Uncle said.

“It did, but the buildings are still there. Maybe he just wanted to see them.”

His mother’s theory suggested someone more sentimental than the father Yitian had known. Still, he had no other ideas, and at least pursuing this one would allow him the feeling of momentum, much preferable to the helplessness of sitting in this home.

“All right,” he said. “We’ll go to the police station and then see about visiting the barracks.”

“The police?” Second Uncle said.

“He thinks going to the police will be helpful.”

Second Uncle laughed, slapping his knees. What did they know? Yitian thought. His mother couldn’t even read, and Second Uncle would always be the town drunk, whatever he might have said he’d become. The idea of wandering across the province alone, with no authority to help him, scared Yitian. He couldn’t imagine going that far without first making some report, some record.

“Fine, then. We can go after lunch,” his mother said. She asked Second Uncle if he would stay but he shook his head. “Second Aunt is already preparing food.” He turned to Yitian and said, “You should come see her while you’re here, if you find yourself with any time.”

“Yes, it’s been so long since you’ve seen her. We’ll come tomorrow,” Yitian’s mother said.

“I’m not sure we can. It’s going to be busy with Ba—” He was silenced by the hurt look on Second Uncle’s face.

“Right, right, of course. You’re a busy man now,” Second Uncle said.

After they were sure Second Uncle had gone out of earshot, his mother snapped back at him. “How could you have been so rude? Did they teach you in America to talk to others like this?”

He’d forgotten how much they cared about good manners in this world, allowing concerns of etiquette to overwhelm urgency and logic. Even if it was true that he was only concerned for his father, he shouldn’t have voiced such a thought out loud. He should have agreed to come and then never shown up—that would have been more acceptable. In America, he was sure there would be no regard toward politeness at a moment like this. Neither would his father have worried about telling a guest to leave if there was something more important to deal with. His father was direct in his speech, his own wants coming before all else. On nights when he drank too much, he simply rose and—without a second glance to any of the guests he’d invited—lay down in his bed. Sometimes he even forgot to kick off his slippers, and they dangled dangerously from his toes as he slept. Yitian’s mother was the one left with the task of saying goodbye to the guests, making the situation acceptable for the version that would be later repeated as gossip around the village.

“I’m sorry, Ma. It’s just that I don’t know how long I can stay.” He went to the sink where she was rinsing cups. He almost took her wet hand in his, the way he might comfort Mali. But his body had absorbed a heaviness now that the initial commotion had settled, the weight of their traditions that dictated one’s body should be held at a distance from others. Touch couldn’t be relied on for comfort.

“You don’t know how long you can stay? Why not?”

“I talked to the head of my department—” He stopped himself. She wouldn’t understand if he explained about needing to return to his job or the concept of limited leave. He’d lied to the chair, saying his father had just been diagnosed with a serious illness. The chair, an old man who hadn’t produced any significant research in decades, had told him to take as much time as he needed.

His mother turned off the water and asked, “Is Mali’s health still good?” She’d tried to make her voice casual and low, but still he could tell that this was the question she had been waiting to ask. She’d spoken the same words on the phone almost every time he called. If they had access to a truer language, he knew what she would say. Why had Mali still not given her a grandchild? Sometimes he heard Americans his age joking about how desperately their parents wanted grandchildren. He commiserated, though what they spoke of was nothing like his mother’s own want, deeper and more primary. When his parents had been married this long, both Yitian and his brother were old enough to start school. Conception had seemed like a natural rhythm of the world back then, mysterious but inevitable, not the opaque and ungiving process it was now. “We’re waiting until things are more stable here,” he’d told his mother, when he and Mali first moved to America. When he looked at how much money they had left each month after rent and groceries and the car loan, he could not fathom how to make it stretch any further. “We’ll start soon,” he’d said to his mother then, as if having a child was a matter as simple as beginning one’s homework. He’d been able to brush off the initial difficulties with conception as momentary bad luck, but now two years had passed and they could no longer evade their growing doubts. The referral to the fertility clinic had been stuck to their refrigerator for months, still untouched.