Chapter 10
I can't believe I got to second base with Calvin over soup-dumplings last night! It's all I can think about the next day. I'm giddy as I follow my preceptor around, pretending to take notes about acupuncture points of the knee.
She is so busy that she makes me interview new patients before she sees them to save time. I quickly discover that interviewing patients is not as straightforwards as asking them a list of questions about their surgical history and what is ailing them. None of the old ladies I speak to that morning can name what medications they are on. Some of them show me a picture of a green pill that they dig out of their back pocket and tell me it is for "good health."
I download an app that helps me to identify medications by size and shape. By noon I already know what all the hypertension pills look like. I may not be much of an acupuncturist, but I can consider myself a guru of shades of pill colors.
During my lunch hour, I can't focus at all on eating the lukewarm dish of duck blood and cellophane noodle soup, even though it is my favorite among the dishes in the hospital cafeteria. I toss some bits of my scallion pancake to the sparrows that swooped down from the rafters. There was something oddly romantic about this place, with its ancient wooden lockers growing soft and chipped with age.
The crisp light from the windows seemed to filter in and leave dappled paintings of sunshine on the chipped tiles of the cafeteria. I didn't know anyone here, so I usually spent my lunch hours studying the sparrows.
Although I was alone, I felt strangely at home here. It's so odd to be somewhere where everyone ate noodles during lunch. It's not Chinese culture week at school or anything; this is just what people here ate all the time. It's like breathing a sigh of relief that I didn't have to force myself to eat that cardboard pizza where the cheese lifted off like a sheet of oilpaper that our public school usually served.
Finally, I decide to go outside for a walk in the courtyard. I could see the tin boxes of used acupuncture needles sticking out in the air like some medical version of the Iron Throne from the windows. The windows are open, and I could see glimpses of patients behind dark blue curtains. As I walk, I breathe in the dusty air from the nearby construction site. The air feels hot and warm against my skin; my Zara denim jacket feels wet and heavy against my skin. There's a downtrodden romance about this place like it's a gothic wonderland both familiar and strange, perhaps from a past life which I couldn't remember.
I replay in my mind my last words with Calvin before heading for my subway station.
"You're cool, Sara," he had hollered at me with a rakish smile on his face. "Let's have some fun, okay?"
Yeah, fun. This is fun. I'm a cool girl.
I don't need any defined relationships. I don't care about exclusivity. No, that's for the not-cool-girls. I'm one of the good ones.
Yeah, I think to myself, this is perfect. This is exactly what I want. Who wants to be Calvin's girlfriend anyway?
Maybe I do. . .
"Xiao Yishen Mèimei," a voice comes from the doorway leading into the stairwell. There's a man smoking a cigarette who is holding the door open with his foot. I recognize him even though he has sunglasses on. Also, he's the only one who would call me "little doctor" because my acupuncture patients all know that I'm most definitely not a doctor. It is that superstar Fang Yao who everyone seems to think is a big deal around here.
No wonder he's hunched over, wearing giant sunglasses and smoking in an abandoned stairwell.
"Mr. Yao, you're here to see Dr. Su again?" I ask, in my best attempt at sounding professional. I'm lucky that he spoke to me in Shanghainese. I'm sure my Mandarin would give me away instantly as something who didn't have much schooling around these parts (I'm sure that's the common language in school).
"No, he's refusing to give me an appointment today even though I dearly need one," Fang replies and flicks his cigarette off into the bushes. "So you're the acupuncture specialist around here, aren't you?" Instead of specialist, he says "sifu," like I'm some sort of Yoda of acupuncture. I'm most definitely not, but I blush anyway.
"I-I can take you to my senior doctor," I told him. "I'm sure she can fit you in today."
"I have a fake identity that I like to use when I'm not with Dr. Su," Fang tells me as he starts to follow me in the direction of the acupuncture wing. "Can you call me by that name when we are with your acupuncture friends?"
"Sure," I reply in a chipper voice. I don't even really know what his real name means, so a fake name would be even easier. Heck, I don't even know what my Chinese name means; that's how good I am at not pining down identities. "You got it, Mr. Yao."
"It's Yáo," he corrects. "Not yāo. If you are going to treat me, you can at least call me by the right name."
Okay. So this guy is a jerk. I wonder if I should stick my tongue out at him and run off. I'm not a doctor here; I don't have to be professional or take his crap.
"You speak English, right?" He asks suddenly. I nod. Oh no, now he's figured out that it's worthless trying to communicate with me. I expect him to walk away, but instead, he smiles.
"You can call me Ethan if that's easier; that's what my English teachers used to call me."
Oh wow, he speaks perfect English, not even a hint of an English accent. I'm accustomed to most people who learned English overseas to have learned British English, but this guy speaks perfect American English. Heck, it's probably better than mine since I've been told I have a New York accent.
"Okay, I'm Sara Wang," I reply eagerly. Even though I've only been here a week, it's a relief to be able to talk to someone else in English again. Someone who isn't trying to make me into his fuck buddy, at least. "I'll help you set up an appointment. If you come with me right now, we can go and get you checked in."
"An appointment?" Fang asks and sighs. "You can't take me over there right now?"
"It's a busy day. There is a little boy who came all the way from Russia to get treated for a dropped foot."
"Oh ta-ma-de," Fang curses, and I have to chuckle. On the bright side, at least he was cursing at my preceptor and her schedule, not at my inability to communicate. It is an achievement that he understood my English, and we are having a real conversation, one where I don't sound like I have the vocabulary of a six-year-old.
"I'll come back another day," Fang says and glances at his watch. "How about Monday, noon?"
"Sure. I'll tell her you're a VIP from Dr. Su."
"Will the needles really work?" He gives me a skeptical look, and I wish I knew more about this branch of medicine to convince him otherwise.
"Yeah . . . I've seen it work miracles."
"Good," he says. "That's exactly what I need. Xiao Yishen," he says to me affectionately as though I had already cured him of whatever it is that is ailing him. "If I don't get better, I'll lose my job, my career, my girlfriend."
"Not much of a girlfriend if she leaves you just because you're sick," I offer helpfully.
"I've known her a long time," Fang says with a slight smile on his pale lips. "She and I were destined to be together, and I'm destined to go back to being the man she fell in love with. Isn't that what the papers are saying?" Fang rolls his eyes like he's reciting lines from a script.
"Why don't you tell the papers you are on vacation on a lavish resort somewhere in the Maldives? Tell them you're taking a mental health break. Maybe they'll stop speculating on your love-life."
"I don't care what the papers are saying. What's important is that no one can know that I can't sing anymore."
"Oh," I say as though this isn't shocking to me at all. Fang can't sing anymore? No wonder he's desperate for a miracle. I wonder who his girlfriend is if she's some billionaire heiress or an international movie actress. Who the heck would dump a guy as hot as this one just because he's lost his singing ability? On top of that, he actually likes her, and he's not just using her as a sex-buddy like Calvin is using me. "I'm sure you'll get better."
"You need to help me, little doctor."
"I'll try my best, Ethan. . .I mean Fang. Fang, am I pronouncing that right?"
"Good enough," he says with a sigh and turns away. "You sure you're not Taiwanese or Japanese? I've never heard anyone pronounce it that way before."
No, I just learned Chinese by watching many soap operas and wuxia dramas growing up, I wanted to explain, but I stopped myself before he could think twice about coming to this "acupuncture" appointment I was setting up for him.