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“You are such a silly girl! Of course not!”
“Well, then, what’s the reason? Why haven’t I received a letter?”
“Who knows? This is China. Things run smoothly one day and go crazy the next.”
“I just … I just have a bad feeling—”
“Then write to May and ask her advice—”
“She doesn’t know anything about what it’s like here. She doesn’t understand.”
“May is your sister. She may not know China anymore, but she knows you. And you worry too much. Your head goes to too many dark places. She’ll say, ‘Calm down, Pearl-ah!’ ”
“It’s hard for me to say what I feel in a letter.”
“Then you should see each other. Why don’t you meet her in Hong Kong?”
“May actually suggested that in her last letter,” I say.
“Well?”
“If I can’t get a travel permit to see Joy, then how am I going to get an exit permit to see May?”
“These are two different things. One is to the countryside—”
“And one is out of the country.”
“What if you meet your sister at the fair in Canton?”
“May suggested that too. She thought she might be able to get a day permit to visit the fair to buy costumes for her movie rental business and canned goods for the café. I don’t think she’d be able to get that kind of permit, but even if she did, I’d still have to get a travel permit. If Superintendent Wu ever gave me one, I’d use it to see Joy.”
“Then try for a one-day exit permit. See what happens.”
“I’d love to see May, and maybe sometime in the future I’ll try to get a one-day exit permit. But not now, not when the baby is due next month.”
We go back to the salon. Then Auntie Hu walks Dun and me to the front door, where she holds us back.
“I’ve been thinking about it,” she says to Dun. “The two of you should try to leave China. I lost my husband and my son, but if they were alive, I’d be telling them we should get out of here.”
It’s strange that she suddenly feels so adamant about this and is pushing so hard when she knows I won’t leave China permanently without Joy.
“You’re the one who should go abroad, Madame Hu,” Dun says.
“Yes, I’ve thought about it, and I’m trying,” she confides in a low voice. “I have a sister in Singapore. I haven’t seen her since she married out more than forty years ago.”
I’m startled by her revelation. “You’ve never mentioned this before. How can you leave?”
“How can I not leave? Your mother was the smart one. She got you and your sister out in time.”
I don’t add that, yes, she did, but she died horribly in the process.
“I started going to the police station and the Foreign Affairs Bureau to apply for an exit permit more than a year ago,” Auntie Hu goes on.
I’m surprised by how much this hurts me. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I didn’t have anything to tell in the beginning. I didn’t think I had a chance. Some people wait forever to get an exit permit. Others can get a permit to go to Hong Kong for a day very quickly. I thought I’d be in the forever category. Now they say they may give me an exit permit because they’re sure I’ll return. They think I can’t live without servants!” She lets out a wicked cackle. “They don’t know me very well.”
I think they know her better than she knows herself. Auntie Hu has never lived without servants. She has bound feet and is in many ways as isolated as Yong is in Green Dragon Village. She doesn’t know about housecleaning, laying out her own clothes (let alone washing, ironing, or putting them on by herself), cooking (let alone grocery shopping, doing anything beyond boiling water, or scrubbing pots and pans), or working to make ends
