Marsh is still standing behind Gugu. John’s focus shifts to him, his eyes sharp, before he softens the predator look with a friendly smile. “And you are?”
“Marsh Brody.” He slides into the chair next to Gugu. “I’m a friend of the family.”
I have to say it’s a little weird when I’m one of the more sober people at a gathering like this. Everybody’s slugging down this crazy-expensive wine like it’s Yanjing Draft, everybody except for maybe John, who’s really good at taking a gulp when everyone’s watching and taking minimal sips when they’re not.
Normally I’d be all over keeping up with the Caos in the drinking department, but this whole evening has me spooked. Nothing bad’s happened yet, not that I know of anyway, but I feel like something bad’s hovering just overhead, like one of those dreams I have sometimes when a jet drops out of the sky and comes crashing down on top of me.
I’m sitting there thinking this when Meimei leans over and refills my wine.
“Thank you,” I say.
She puts down the bottle and rests her elbow on the table, her head on her hand, posed like a model in one of those old Hong Kong cigarette ads. “So is this your lover? He’s pretty good-looking.”
“I… uh, he’s a friend.”
She laughs. “I see. Of course, friendship can take many forms.” Her hand stretches out in my direction. She picks up her wineglass, fingers closing gently around the stem, all the while smiling at me.
Is this some kind of come-on?
I take a gulp of wine.
Maybe Meimei’s just plastered. She’s been giggling a lot, which at least would make her a happy drunk. Unlike Tiantian, who has this pissy expression on his face as he wags his finger in Gugu’s general direction, and Gugu, who’s doing his best sullen-teenager impression. Meanwhile Dao Ming looks like she’s wound herself up a few notches tighter, which can’t be good-I can see the tendons in her neck standing out from here.
As for Marsh, he just leans back in his chair smirking, at one point wiping wine from his lips with his fingers.
I can’t quite get a read on Uncle Yang. He’s flushed and sweating, the only real giveaway that he might be drunk. Smiling tightly, occasionally nodding or chortling as Gugu and Tiantian argue about something-I can’t hear it well enough to figure out what. I just catch phrases here and there. Tiantian saying, “Why do you want to make something so common? Copy Western trash?”
Gugu laughs. “So I make a film and it’s common. We should serve the people, right? Chairman Mao said that. The people like common things. Stupid entertainments. Why not give them what they want?”
Tiantian catches me watching them. He forces a laugh. “Maybe you can see our problem,” he says to me. “We have different tastes. So how can we work together for this museum?”
Meimei lifts up a hand. “Don’t forget about me.”
“It’s not possible to forget you, Meimei,” Uncle Yang says, sounding maybe a little too jovial.
“Women xuyao yige… yige dongshihui… danshi…” I switch to English. Easier. “We’ll have a board. You’ll vote on things. But you’ll hire a professional director and staff to actually run the place.”
“And we tell them what to do?” Tiantian asks. I get the feeling he likes the idea of telling people what to do.
“Well… it’s better if they tell you. I mean…” I think about the nonprofit that Harrison set up, the one that I supposedly run. Ha, ha. “We need to have a mission statement. That’s something you guys have to agree on. And then you let the people you hire do their job. You kind of guide each other.”
“Democratic centralism,” Gugu pronounces with a snort, falling back in his chair. Oh, yeah. He’s really loaded.
“I don’t know, maybe?” I say. “It’s more like unless you want to be running the thing day to day, you need to tell the staff what the mission’s about, and then you have to step back a little. Make sure they’re doing it, but let them do it. If that makes sense.”
“You know what else Chairman Mao said,” Gugu says abruptly. He wags a finger. “That the superior man should help the common people. Unless there are too many common people. Then common people just become a burden on the superior man.” He giggles.
Uncle Yang is listening to this really hard. I’m not sure how much English he speaks. Gugu catches his look and repeats in Mandarin what he said about Mao and superior men and the little people.
“Ah, wo mingbai,” Uncle Yang says. I get it. “But Chairman Mao was very young when he said that. Of course, his thinking evolved and deepened. He said we should be guided by the wisdom of the common people.”
“What is the wisdom of the common people? Make money, that’s all. That’s all anyone cares about in this country, right?”
“Some of us care about higher things,” Tiantian snaps. “About China’s culture and place in the world.”
“China’s culture.” Gugu snorts. “What culture? This? This is fake. All fake. Just something you can buy if you have the money. Anyway, what do common people know about this or care? All they want is someone to fuck and an indoor toilet to take a shit.”
“Gugu,” Uncle Yang begins, and I hear the warning in his voice.
“Don’t you start,” Gugu says. “Like you listen to little people. You just want them to shut up and do what they’re told.” He turns to the rest of the table and flings his hand in Uncle Yang’s direction. “Our wise leaders know better.”
“Ah, so tiresome,” Meimei mutters next to me. She’s smiling, though. Watching the show.
“Okay, buddy,” Marsh says in English, clapping Gugu on the shoulder. “Why don’t we take this down a couple of notches? Sorry, everybody,” he says to the table. “Duibuqi. We had a… a meeting with some investors before this. Lots of toasts. You know how it goes.”
“Sorry,” Gugu mumbles. “Sorry. I was speaking nonsense. Wo jiu qiu niubi.”
And for a minute I think everything’s going to be okay.
“I am curious,” John says out of nowhere. “How do you all know about what common people want? Your circumstances are not… not common.” He, too, is smiling. He repeats this in Mandarin for Uncle Yang’s benefit.
“My parents were peasants from Anhui,” Uncle Yang says. “So of course I know.” There’s an edge to his voice that sounds like trouble.
“But this”-John gestures, palms out, at our pricey private room-“this is very far from a village in Anhui.” John smiles at him. He sounds so polite. “So I think you have done very well.”
“Our country has done very well,” Uncle Yang says between clenched teeth, with the kind of smile that looks more like a grimace. He seems to catch himself then and continues, in a friendlier tone, “Of course, we still have much progress to make, so that all Chinese can benefit more.”
“So I’ll make my movies, then.” Gugu leans back in his chair and closes his eyes. “They will be stupid, and common, for the common people. I entertain myself, and they are entertained. Everyone knows his place. Everyone should be happy.”
John stares at him. I can see a nerve twitch in his jaw, and I think, There’s a high potential for this all to go to shit, right about now.
“I wonder sometimes how much common people’s lives are worth,” John says. Very evenly. Like he’s talking about the prices of… I don’t know, cell phones, or purses, or cooking oil. “Just recently I hear about a poor girl, killed and dumped in trash like she is worth nothing. Do we really have respect for that common person?”
For a moment there’s a silence that’s as heavy as an explosion. I see their faces, all of them frozen in mid-expression, like somebody hit pause in the middle of the scene.
Yeah, John just dropped the bomb.