"Of course I would. I had my blood drawn too," Nan said.
After a thorough exam, which ascertained that Moli was healthy, Dr. Caruth explained to the girl's parents the process of marrow donation through Mei Hong's interpretation. The couple was fully convinced that it wouldn't impair their daughter's health, and they signed the paperwork. Nan and Pingping wondered why the girl herself hadn't said a word about the decision made for her by others. Did she want to donate her bone marrow or not? Wasn't she scared? Pingping asked Moli once, but the pumpkin-faced girl just replied, "Aunt Hong says I should help save Hailee, and if I were sick, others would do the same for me." Asked further, she'd say no more. Pingping felt for her so much that she packed a box of assorted appetizers for her, but Moli wouldn't accept it, not until Mei Hong told her to take it home and let her parents know it came from the Gold Wok.
A few days later Moli's bone marrow was injected into Hailee. The child's initial reaction was disheartening. She ran a high fever, and fluid was building up in her lungs, which made her wheeze. An X-ray showed her heart was enlarged considerably. She had to be kept in intensive care. The doctors at Emory Hospital, where Hailee stayed, said these problems were normal after a bone marrow transplant and it was too early to conclude that the treatment had failed. The Mitchells kept their fingers crossed.
Then, a week later, Hailee's fever subsided some and a soft sheen returned to her cheeks. When she smiled, a sparkle appeared in her eyes again. Her lungs began to clear and the size of her heart was shrinking. All the tests indicated that the transplanted bone marrow had been producing new blood cells. Now, positively, her leukemia was in remission.
Hailee's leukemia was cured eventually, and Mei Hong became another of her godmothers, though the Wus still avoided her.
5
IN EARLY JUNE, Nan had won a prize in a raffle at Grand Panda Supermarket. He was offered the plane fare for a round trip from Atlanta to Beijing. By now he had become a U.S. citizen and would have no difficulty getting a tourist visa from the Chinese consulate in Houston. Should he go back to visit? He asked his wife, who disliked the idea. Then should they let the tickets, worth $650, be wasted?
Nan begged Pingping to allow him to go back for a short visit. It was so hot these days that the restaurant didn't have much business. With the help of Chef Mu, everything would be all right at the Gold Wok. But Pingping wouldn't let him leave. He continued pleading with her for a few weeks, to no avail. Finally he said he wanted to see his parents before they died. Those words made his wife relent.
Nan decided to depart within a week. He wondered if he should visit his parents-in-law in Jinan City as well, but Pingping, after giving thought to that, told him not to-she wanted him to come back as soon as possible. She planned to return and see her parents once she was naturalized. Nan promised he'd make a quiet trip and come back in just a week or so. She also warned him not to speak against the Chinese government publicly. In the past the police had often questioned his siblings about his activities abroad. Not until two years ago had they stopped harrying them, because his father had assured the authorities that Nan had "cleaned up his act" and was no longer a dissident.
What Pingping didn't know was that Nan wanted to return to China for another purpose also-to see Beina. He didn't intend to resume a relationship with her; he just needed that woman's face and voice to rekindle his passion so that he could write poetry. He needed the vision of an ideal female figure for his art, just like a painter who uses a model. Yes, he wanted to use her just as she had once used him.
Nan boarded a Boeing 737 bound for Beijing one morning in late July. As the plane taxied toward the runway, somehow he didn't feel excited. He looked around and saw that almost half the passengers were Chinese, and nobody paid heed to the imminent takeoff. He remembered the intense excitement he and the other passengers had experienced twelve years ago when he flew for the first time in his life, from Beijing to San Francisco. As the plane was taking off, many of them had applauded and some had leaned aside toward the portholes to catch through the ragged clouds a bird's-eye view of the cityscape of the capital, which tilted while the plane banked a little. He also remembered how he and his fellow travelers, most of whom were students, had been nauseated by a certain smell in the plane- so much so that it had made some of them unable to swallow the inflight meal of Parmesan chicken served in a plastic dish. It was a typical American odor that sickened some new arrivals. Everywhere in the United States there was this sweetish smell, like a kind of chemical, especially in the supermarket, where even vegetables and fruits had it. Then one day in the following week Nan suddenly found that his nose could no longer detect it. Another memory of his first flight brought a smile to his face. Like some of the passengers crossing the Pacific Ocean for the first time, after eating the lunch he had wiped the plastic fork and knife clean and noticed people looking at one another and wondering what to do with these things. Some of them put the knives and forks into their pockets or handbags, carrying them all the way to their destinations in America, because they couldn't imagine that all the plastic containers and tools were disposable. They had no idea what kind of plentitude and waste they were going to encounter in this new land.
This trip, however, excited Nan in a different way. He planned to visit his friend Danning in Beijing, then his parents in Harbin, where Beina must be living as well. He hadn't told any of them about his return and meant to give them a surprise.
He brought along a poetry anthology, The Voice That Is Great Within Us, which he read from time to time during the flight. But he dozed off frequently since he hadn't slept well the night before. He was glad he was seated in an exit row and had more leg room. On his left lounged a lumpy-faced man, who was on his way back to his job in Shanghai but would stop in Beijing for a day or two on business. The man introduced himself as Yujing Fang and complained he couldn't smoke the whole way. Because he was in a window seat, unable to talk to others, now and then he tried to converse with Nan. He said he had earned an M.B.A. from the University of Chicago and worked for GE in China. But his wife and two children lived in New Jersey, and he could visit them a few times a year, plane fares paid by the company.
"That's hard," Nan said. "I mean, to be separated from your family."
"Yes, in the beginning just the phone bills would cost five hundred dollars a month, but now I use phone cards and we're accustomed to the separation."
"Why don't you find a job in the States?"
"My position in Shanghai is important and lucrative. I manage a branch of our company there."
"Do they pay you an American salary?" "Of course."
"Then you must be a millionaire."
"Truth be told, I don't count pennies when I go shopping." "Tell me, what are the fashionable gifts in China at the moment?" " Color TV sets are still presentable. Air conditioners, digital cameras, computers-ah, yes, vitamins." "Do people take vitamin pills?"
" Sure. Twenty bottles of multiple vitamins can grease a large palm. Wisconsin ginseng is always popular too."
"Life must be better for many people in China now. Few of them could afford those supplements ten years ago."
"Another very expensive present is just coming into fashion in Shanghai."
" Which is?"
"Enemas."
" What did you say?"
"Enemas, having your intestines rinsed once in a while."
"Why?"
"To prevent cancer and other diseases." "But how can they be a gift?"
"That's easy. You buy a book of tickets for enemas at a hospital and give it to another person who can go there for the treatment."