Then came a pause. He stared at her, wanting more; they had been young lovers once, she had borne him three children.
He pulled her to him and kissed her, and she hugged him, pushing her face to the side of his; she would have her freedom after he was gone. Siao called to him from beyond the gate.
Mr Haseem beeped again, she patted him. 'Go, or your good friend will drop you in the shit,' she said.
And unbidden tears came into her eyes. This was very convenient; she made sure he saw them. There were wisps of fear at being left alone, wisps of loss for Joe, who was her domestic companion.
'I will see Lung and our daughter,' he said. 'I will bring back news of Lung.' Joe worshiped his athletic, achieving, military son.
'That will be the best part,' she said. 'Now, hurry, hurry!'
Joe grinned, like a boy again, and broke into a run. He waved at the gate again.
He thinks I love him, she thought. He thinks that in the end we are still man and wife. And she remembered him when he was sixteen, handsome, a leader of the village youth.
Joe never grew up. She heard the car door slam, she heard male exuberance, a chattering, a yelling. She remembered him, his hair greased up, a toothpick never out of his mouth, car insignia stolen from vehicles in the valley pinned to the back of his jacket. She heard the van grind its way down the mountain road.
She listened to the sound of loneliness, the sound of dust. Mr Ken's house was there, like he was – ever present, always close, with a door that could both open and conceal.
Mae was walking before she knew it. I need to be out in the fields by late afternoon, she thought, or people will talk. It was still lunchtime. The children would be napping in Mr Shen's school, Mr Ken's mother might be sleeping before returning to the fields. If not, she could always say: Who will do your weeding for you, Mr Ken? I and the village women could offer to help.
She walked into Mr Ken's kitchen. He was sipping soup, his late breakfast. He looked up, still shiny with sweat from weeding his own fields.
'Joe's gone,' she said quietly. 'And his brother.'
'I'll be along,' he said.
She walked back to her own house, shaking. Her body was like Mr Haseem's truck rattling down the road. This is crazy, if anyone comes to call, they will find us. She pinned up the window curtains and drew shut the heavy draught-curtains across the doorway. She took down her sun hat, her jumper, her apron to collect the compost, her high-soled field clogs. She rammed them under the bed. Their absence would signal she was not there. All of that would signaclass="underline" Mrs Chung is out at work. How then did she draw shut the draught-curtains? She opened them again.
She lay down on the bed, still smelling of Joe. It smelled of Joe but that smell would now be driven out by the smell of Mr Ken. That thought alone seemed to loosen the corsets of her belly. I will smell him when I sleep at night.
She heard the latch. Her breath caught. No one called out her name. She heard the latch close. Her heart was pumping. This is mad – if it is not him how will I explain? I will say I caught too much sun and I am ill. The curtains of the alcove were pulled back, rattling on their plastic rings.
It was him and he was smiling. He was shiny no longer. He had bathed.
He was naked under his overalls, which he flung utterly aside, and he was soon on top of her. His skin was as perfect as apricots.
The next day Mae went back out onto her husband's land.
The Chungs had one valley paddy and two long terraces very high up the mountainside. Mae had neglected them since planting the nursery rice. Dock and bindweed were already sprouting between the onions and rice shoots.
She began the long climb up the beaten paths. The swallows swooped about her, scooping insects out of the air. The terraces creaked and buzzed with the sound of crickets. Water lay in puddles, as warm as soup.
On her terrace the air was hot, still, breathless. The heat did a shivering fan-dance in the air. Only the kites circling high overhead looked cool.
Mae went to work hauling out weeds. Her back was soon aching. Tears of sweat wept into the ground. This delicious rice, she thought, it will be seasoned with my own salt.
Her clogged feet sank deep into the creamy soil with every step. The mud sucked and clung like a lover. Her high, broad hat kept the sun off her neck, shoulders, and even her arms. It could not keep away the flies and the midges. Come friend swallow, here is a feast, free me from flies. She waved her hands at the midges but they returned to tickle and stick to her skin that was like cooked rice, glutinous and steaming.
Mae stood up. She could see far below on the plain the livid green paddies of wet rice. The slashes of mirror among them were water reflecting sky. Beyond – hazy, losing all shape in bright sunlight – were the flat yellows, beiges, and greys of the distant mountains.
Was it like this in your day, Old Mrs Tung?'
No.
The voice was like wind.
Suddenly with a lurch Mae fell, growing smaller. The world collapsed around her, deflating. She was somewhere else.
Little Miss Hu was swung up away from the ground and out over the paddies, holding on to a high wooden arm. The arm was part of a pump for transferring water higher up the mountain.
Miss Hu hung for a moment, giggling in a mixture of fear and delight. Boys sat on the other end of the arm, a huge ball of dried mud. Miss Hu drew a breath and let go and dropped down. Her heart rose into her mouth and the mud greeted her like a mother with a plump hug. The little girl stood up coated in wet earth and whooped to the boys in triumph.
She jumped up and down, splashing in the mud, not caring about her old paddy clothes. 'Again! Again!' she demanded. The boys lowered the arm and she ascended again. She looked out across the valley.
The terraces were lined with pumps, dipping their heads like graceful marsh birds. Below, on the hillside, there was no schoolhouse, no mosque.
The opposite mountain was striated like an onion in layers of paddies. The terraces climbed in steps, green and lush, to the village of Aynalar. Its main street zigzagged up the narrow pass between high, fine stone houses with whitewashed walls and stained-glass windows. There was a dome and a minaret.
Hu Ai-ling looked at it with yearning. One day, she promised, I will live in Aynalar.
She let go again and Mae lurched out of the past.
She blinked and that same hill was now beige and featureless, a mass of tumbled grey stone. If you focused, you could see traces – traces only – of the walls.
The flood had washed one terrace down onto another, wiping them all away. One whole side of the valley had gone. No one spoke of it now, no one remembered. It was healed scar tissue. The opposite hillside, once layered with fields, stared back at her like an old blind face.
Mae remembered Old Mrs Tung. She had always sat at her attic window, facing out across the valley, wind in her face, blind. She had been looking in the direction of Aynalar as if, for her, it was still there.
This is worrying, thought Mae. No, this is really worrying, the way the world shrugs, and suddenly there is the past, there is the future. Like I have a sickness in my head.
No one said this would happen. They did not say you would visit the past. They did not say dead friends would not leave. They do not understand what Air is. She felt the wind move, chilling her wet arms like fear.
Where is this? Mrs Tung asked.
All Mae wanted when she got home was a chance to think, but waiting in her kitchen was her brother, Wang Ju-mei.
'Afternoon, sister,' Ju-mei said. He wore his cream-coloured summer suit.