A Free Life

As Taotao was striding away, his mother caught up with him. She grasped his upper arm and stopped him, saying, "You must apologize to Daddy."

"He started it. Ow! Don't break my humerus!" "I don't care who start. You curse him, you apologize." She was still clutching his arm. "No, I won't!"

"He's your father. In whole world, if you can find another man who is better to you than Daddy, you don't need apologize. If you ca

Taotao looked at her with a knotted brow, then ambled back to the house. Yanking open the screen door, he shouted, "I'm sorry, Daddy, okay?"

"That's fine," said Nan.

Although the exchange with his son spoiled Nan 's desire to work on his poem about the injured duck, he was amazed that during the whole altercation none of them had spoken a single Chinese word. He went out to the deck and swept away the pollen and dust, pleased he had contained his temper this time.

On occasion Taotao still showed animosity toward Nan. One sentence he often hurled at him was "You were never there." Nan knew what he meant-the boy still resented Nan 's absence from his early childhood. Yet Nan would reply, "Who said I wasn't there? I was the first person who saw you coming out of your mahther. Your head appeared first, with sleek hair." That would exasperate his son more.

Without doubt, Taotao viewed Nan as a kind of rival in the household. Whenever possible, he'd strive to monopolize his mother's attention and love, interrupting Nan's conversations with Pingping or sitting between his parents, or pi

Sometimes Nan wondered what it would have been like if he'd had a daughter instead of a son. Deep down, he'd have preferred a girl, who might have treated him with more affection and attachment, and who might have helped him more with the work at the restaurant-not like Taotao, who would feel ashamed of clearing tables in the presence of the kids he knew and would complain to his parents, "Haven't I been a servant boy long enough?" Nan wouldn't respond to that, though he felt Pingping had spoiled their son. If only they'd had a daughter.

6

IN THE SPRING of 1996 Pingping found herself pregnant. The expectation of a new arrival in the family agitated everyone. Taotao was furious and said his parents were outrageous. "I'm almost thirteen. Am I going to be an uncle of the baby?" he blustered.

Nan countered, "Once you go to college, we need anozzer child at home."

"I don't want any siblings."

Pingping remained silent. The boy seemed afraid that the new arrival would become the center of the family. "Selfish brat," said his father. "Shut the hell up!"

Nan throttled his impulse to yell back at his son. In fact, he was the only one in the family who was happy about Pingping's pregnancy, because he imagined that the baby might provide a new focus for his life. He wouldn't mind spending the rest of his years raising the child if it was a girl.

Unlike him, Pingping was frightened, for she was already forty and might not be able to give birth easily. Also, this wasn't like in China, where her parents, both doctors, could help her. Here she was alone and couldn't rely on Nan, who wasn't good at taking care of others. More worrisome, the medical expenses would be enormous since their health insurance covered only emergencies. What if she died in childbirth? Then Taotao would be motherless and Nan would be wretched too. There were so many risks to consider that she had gotten restless. She told Nan about her fear, but he replied, "Don't worry. Everything will work out fine. We have some extra money now and can afford to raise another child."

An ultrasound at the Norcross Medical Center showed it was a healthy baby, though it was too early to find out its sex. Somehow both Nan and Pingping had no doubt that it was a girl. From a tiny black box like a camera a nurse let the Wus hear the baby's heartbeat, which raced rapidly like a bird flapping its wings. "Very strong," Nan said, beaming as thin creases grooved the skin under his eyes.

Stacy, the nurse, told them, "Actually, the pulse is rather shallow, but it will get stronger as the baby grows." Her chubby fingers kept pressing Pingping's belly, which hadn't bulged out yet. The baby was just two months old.

Despite paying $236 for the checkup, Nan was elated. During the following days he and Pingping began thinking what name they should give the baby. Whatever they came up with, Taotao would say it sounded silly. Ignoring the boy's grouchiness, Pingping and Nan settled on "May," which is phonetically identical with the Chinese characters beauty and plum blossoms. Indeed, such a name was commonplace, but the plai

Gradually Taotao cooled down, willing to accept a sister as a new member of their family, though his mother was still anxious. Sometimes Pingping was an insomniac at night, tossing in bed and thinking about all the unpredictable things. What if the baby turns out to be retarded or has a congenital illness? I'm already forty-anything like that can happen. What if I die in childbirth? That'll destroy Tao-tao and devastate Nan -our family will collapse. I won't worry about Nan, who can get along without me. If I'm dead, he might find another woman soon and might even go back to China to look for Beina. Although he says he's too tired to love anyone, I know him better than he knows himself-he could forget me and marry another woman soon after I'm gone. But I wouldn't begrudge him that. He deserves to go on with his life, to form a new family. What I ca

In the morning Pingping's face would be sickly and bloated. She also retched a lot, convulsing with the dry heaves. There were many things her stomach wouldn't digest, such as cheese, tofu, spinach, fish, chicken. Yet she got hungry so frequently that she ate seven or eight meals a day. "This baby is a monster," she kept saying.