We head west, up into the foothills. The lights thin out, the houses, too, until it’s nothing but darkness, the occasional house with a lit window, a few passing cars.
“Daole,” the driver says. We’ve arrived.
A crumbling stone wall, a glimpse of peaked roof with weeds growing in the shingles. Dim lights. Faint music.
“Can you wait for me?” I ask. “I can pay you.”
She shakes her head. “I’m off work now. Going home.”
“So if I need to get back to town?”
“I think maybe foreigners come to this house all the time,” she says with a little grin. “So I think you can find a taxi.”
“Okay,” I say. “Thanks.”
I pay her and get out. My heart’s pounding in my throat, and I have to steady myself with my Yangshuo walking stick.
I am not nearly drunk enough to be this stupid.
First thing I do is switch my iPhone back on, GPS and all. This is one of those situations where maybe I’d rather have certain people find me than just disappear off the radar and end up… I don’t know, as pig food. ’Cause you know pigs will eat anything, including people. And I think I hear pigs. Snuffling. Snorting. Or maybe that’s the music.
I open up the splintering wood gate. It’s so dark that I can barely see a foot in front of me. I wake up my phone, use it as a flashlight. There’s probably an app for that, but I don’t have it.
There’s a dirt path that leads up to what seems to be the main building, a grey shape in the dark. The roof I saw before is just some kind of shed or barn or something. Maybe abandoned. This doesn’t look like an active farm, from what I can see. There’s an ancient blue farm truck, though, and a newer lime green Chery parked off to one side, on the border of an overgrown field.
Holy crap, what a tremendously stupid idea this was.
Why am I doing this? What the fuck’s wrong with me?
I take a moment and go into my contacts on the phone. Hesitate, then find one. My finger hovers over the number. I don’t want to call it. But just in case.
As I approach the door to what I guess is the farmhouse, a dog starts barking like a pit bull in a crack den.
And the front door of the farmhouse slams open.
“Shei laile?” someone yells. Chinese. A skinny silhouette backlit by interior light. The dog at his side lunges forward. The music is louder now, with the door open. I’m thinking it might be Radiohead.
“Ni hao,” I manage. “I’m, uh… Russell invited me to come.” The figure hesitates. I still can’t make out his face. The dog growls.
“Okay,” he finally says. “Qing jin.” Come in.
When I get inside, I feel a little better.
It’s another converted farmhouse with whitewashed walls, now covered in a combination of graffiti murals and posters. There’s a Western guy, not Jason, with a knit cap, a Plastered T-shirt, and a backpacker beard, sitting next to a lanky Chinese girl wearing embroidered bell-bottoms and a fake-fur jacket. There’s the Chinese guy who opened the door-glasses, shaggy hair, red Li-Ning soccer jersey. A couple of guitars and a beat-to-shit drum kit, a battered amp. Empty beer bottles on flimsy tables and the floor. Folding chairs. Fast-food containers. Overflowing ashtrays. A strong scent of pot.
It’s familiar, at least. I’ve been in a lot of rooms like this. And it’s generally worked out okay. Most of the time.
I put my phone back into my jacket pocket.
“Is Russell here?” I ask.
The Chinese guy nods. “Yeah. Sure.”
The Western guy takes a hit off a joint mixed with tobacco and coughs on the exhale. “Hey, Russell!” he yells. American. “You got someone here looking for you.”
The Chinese guy indicates a chair. “You can sit if you’d like.”
I sit.
The Chinese girl hangs out by the American guy, leaning against him, taking a hit off the spliff. The Chinese guy paces. His dog, which is some kind of yellow mutt with a curled tail, noses his leg, whines.
“Zou, zou, zou,” he mutters, grabbing the dog’s rope collar and hauling him toward the front door. “Go!” he says, one more time, and shoves the dog outside.
I sit there, my daypack on my lap, throat parched, wishing I had a beer. Or a Coke. Or something.
Mainly I wish that I was somewhere else. Like on a bamboo raft, floating down a river. Or in my hotel room. A train. Anyplace.
From across the room, Russell emerges from a dark doorway, beers in hand. “Hey, Ellie,” he says, teeth bared in an attempt at a grin. “You made it. Beer?”
“Sure,” I say. “Thanks.”
“This is Ellie,” Russell says to the others. “She’s a friend of David’s.” He turns to me. “Right?”
“A friend of his family,” I say, taking a long pull on the beer.
“Where is he anyway?” the American guy asks, his voice slurring. “I haven’t seen him in a while.”
Russell jerks his head, shoots the guy a look. “He’ll be here. I just talked to him.”
“Oh. Cool.” He mimes a drum pattern. “Be good to play a little.”
The Chinese guy paces in short, sharp angles. He’s amped. I can see from here that his pupils are dilated. Bingdu, amphetamines of some sort, I’m guessing.
“When’s he coming?” I ask.
“Few minutes, half hour,” Russell says with a shrug. “No worries, he’ll be here.”
The American guy stands up, wobbling, with the Chinese girl on his arm; goes over to the drum kit and almost falls onto the stool; picks up some sticks and tries to play in time to the music. The Chinese guy keeps pacing.
“Hey, is there a bathroom I can use?” I ask.
The Chinese guy stops pacing for a moment. He points at the door where Russell came in. “That way.”
I push myself to my feet with my Yangshou stick and limp back there.
The door leads outside. There’s a small cinder-block building that I’m guessing is an outhouse. I have a real flashlight in my daypack, one of those agro LED models I picked up at the Pearl Market. I get it out and turn it on so I can see what I’m doing.
Sure enough it’s a squat shitter, framed by grey brick. I go inside. Squat and pee, hoping I’ll be able to get up again, the pain in my leg like someone’s stabbing me in the thigh, over and over. Maybe Russell, with his shanzhai Ka-Bar.
While I’m doing this, the yellow dog slinks inside. I hear a low growl.
Great.
I use my Yangshuo stick to boost myself up, my jeans still puddling around my ankles, the dog showing its teeth and growling.
“Fuck, dog, come on!” I mutter. “Your boss invited me inside. Doesn’t that count for something?”
The dog sits back on its haunches. I can’t really see its eyes in the dark, but I think it’s watching me. I tug my jeans up over my ass.
Funny thing, the outhouse smells like shit, obviously, but that’s not all I’m smelling. I fumble the last button on my jeans and look around.
It seems pretty straightforward. Low ceiling. A latrine and a faucet that drains into an iron sink. I look behind me, aiming my phone to cast whatever dim light it can.
There’s a wall and a tiny window, like a vent. I’m not tall enough to see into it. But there’s a tin bucket by the faucet.
I grab it, turn it upside down, get my good leg on it and haul my ass up.
My eyes are just at the level of the little window. From what I can tell, there’s another room at the back of the outhouse. I aim my flashlight.
Some bags piled against the back wall. Bags about a foot and a half long, a foot wide.
My first thought is New Century Hero Rice. But these bags are burlap, from what I can see. No logo.
I press my nose up against the window. Breathe in deep.