Jia Jia remembered a dream that Chen Hang had told her about. He had been in Tibet, alone, for what he had called ‘a spiritual escape from all this crap’. Though Chen Hang was not a religious man, beyond tossing money into donation boxes whenever he was in a temple or a church, he would go, periodically, on these trips by himself. Jia Jia knew that he needed them, but for what, she would rather not consider. She often reassured herself that she was his wife, the woman of his home, and he was a man who had selected his life partner with much consideration, a man who would never desert the woman he had chosen, even if at times his heart rested in someone else’s bed. So for every one of his trips, Jia Jia had packed for him, sent him out the door, and waited for him to return.
This recent trip, perhaps a month ago, had been Chen Hang’s first time in Tibet. One night while he was there, he had called Jia Jia and described a man who had appeared in his dream.
‘He was barely a man,’ he said. ‘In fact, he was a small fish served on a plate, and everybody was eating it. We ate it all, every last piece of meat. Even the bones. But just when we started digging into the head, it began to talk. Boy, was I scared! I’m surprised that didn’t wake me up. When it began to speak, I noticed that it wasn’t a fish. It was a man. The man was talking, laughing, and telling us that he was late and we should not wait for him to begin our meals. I can still hear his roaring laugh.’
He had not remembered the rest of the dream and he had not known who the man was. Jia Jia did not give it too much thought at the time. The only thing she did remember thinking was that Chen Hang must have been alone for him to call her in the middle of the night, that at least on this trip there had not been another woman in his bed. In fact, she had forgotten entirely about his dream until now, because after Chen Hang returned from Tibet, he had not spoken about the fish or the man again.
2
Leo stood alone behind the dark wooden counter of his bar, preparing a drink for his last customer. He wore a white shirt under a black vest with a burgundy bow tie, his sleeves rolled up to his elbows, hands damp from washing glasses. On the record player, Billie Holiday came to an end and he slowly wiped his hands and replaced her with Chet Baker. He always made sure to be calm and well-mannered, limiting his movements only to what was necessary for his work – a skill he had taken years to perfect. He rarely laughed loudly, but was never unfriendly, occasionally engaging in conversation when the bar was not busy. No one knew his real name; being ‘Leo’ was enough for him. He enjoyed that kind of secrecy – a professional, detached persona he could have in his bar. And as an added benefit, having an English name lent the place an air of sophistication.
The night had slowed and only one customer remained sitting at the counter. She was a woman in her early thirties who had visited the bar almost every evening in the past weeks. Leo knew her late husband, Chen Hang. The couple lived in the apartment compound across the road – the husband’s office was nearby as well – so he had been a regular at the bar. Sometimes he came alone, but mostly with others. Very occasionally, he brought his wife with him, but she never stayed longer than the time she needed to finish a single glass of wine. She only drank wine.
Leo always made sure to observe his customers closely and took pleasure in being able to tell what mood they were in, whether they were accompanied by business clients or friends, and how they wanted him to speak to them. He remembered Chen Hang clearly: a clean-shaven man, dark-skinned even in winter, with only occasional hints of southern tones in his Mandarin. Most people would not have questioned his roots but Leo, born and raised in Beijing, had been in the people-watching business of bartending for years. Chen Hang was tall for a southerner, with broad shoulders and a strong physique. But every time he stepped out of the bar he lowered his head, lifted his shoulders, and sped up his footsteps ever so slightly. No matter how many villas and apartments he owned, he would never stroll the city streets like they were his own: a trait that was distinctly ‘Beijingese’, even for its poorest citizens. He had never acquired that particular sense of entitlement.
His wife was different. There was something about her that Leo could not decipher, a kind of aloofness that he found to be refreshing, as if all the world’s interactions had nothing to do with her. Though she was not particularly striking and rather short, her clean features, small face and sloping shoulders reminded Leo of women in ancient ink paintings. Not beautiful, but incredibly feminine. Chen Hang seemed to have recognised that youth and beauty are transient, and so he had chosen her to be his wife; a gracious wife, the kind that a man would take to a dinner party and find, even when his wife was older, that he had become the centre of attention because he had the finest, most tasteful accessory. When he had brought her to the bar, it had been to show his success not only in business but in family as well. Her composure was permanent, and her smile always appeared elegant to Leo, despite her front teeth sticking out a little. It was as if a lid had been set over her emotions, and even if she was boiling inside, the lid held strong.
Since Chen Hang’s death, she had started turning up at the bar fifteen minutes or so before closing time, forcing Leo to keep the place open for a while longer. She would push the door just enough for her thin body to slide through the gap and then proceed to the end of the counter, put her bag on the seat next to her, order a glass of wine, and loosen her bun to let her hair down. Most of the time, she was drunk already. At first, it was difficult for Leo to tell, as she never spoke to anyone and her movements were always rather graceful. It was not until she arrived sober one night that he saw a clear difference in her behaviour. She went through her whole routine – end of the counter, bag on the stool, one drink, hair down – but then she took out a pile of paper and put on a pair of reading glasses. It was not really the reading that gave away her sobriety but rather the focused serenity of her expression: at once curious and determined, like a child who was just beginning to read her first novel.
Tonight, though, she was more intoxicated than usual. She sat on the first seat she stumbled upon, tossing her bag on the floor. She asked for a glass of brandy and Leo served it to her along with a glass of water. With her eyes fixed on the drink, she bent over, lowered her lips to the rim and took a sip.
‘Ah … yes, that’s better. I prefer something strong. Don’t you?’ she said.
‘I always have a glass of this brandy before going to bed,’ Leo responded.
‘No, not just before bed. I mean, I don’t sleep much anyway.’ She took another sip, studied her blurry reflection in the glass, and made a few dabs at her eye bags with her finger. ‘I suppose I just got into the habit of drinking wine. You see, it’s rather elegant, for a woman like me. But sometimes I just need something with more of a punch.’ She lifted her bag from the floor and placed it on the stool. ‘Now please save my seat, I need to get some air.’
‘The air isn’t so fresh tonight,’ said Leo.
She fished out an anti-pollution mask from her pocket and waved it at Leo before pushing the door open.
It was snowing and rather cold, even for a December night in Beijing. The haze contaminated the snow as it descended in flakes the size of sunflower seeds. By one a.m., the road had settled to a slumber under a light grey canopy. Jia Jia hesitated and took a breath, allowing winter to fill her lungs before slowly letting it out. She thought about putting the mask on, changed her mind, and stuffed it back into her pocket. She lit a cigarette and listened to the sleeping city. It was oddly soundless tonight, which suited the dark, deep sky. Her apartment building stood right across the street, gigantic and forbidding.