Morning and Evening Chapter 1

When Chang Ming’an was a child, he lived in an old house. Several five-story residential buildings stood packed tightly together, crowded with people. The shared kitchen and toilet were never quiet. Neighborhood gossip drifted into every household as easily as cooking fumes. Those fumes yellowed the once-white walls, and the gossip became the daily fare on every table.

Ms. He from the building next door was a constant subject of that talk.

She always wore a well-fitted cheongsam, embroidered with colorful patterns that traced the lines of her figure, a glimpse of fair calf showing beneath the hem. At night she would walk home in high heels along the stairwell, the sharp knock-knock of her steps waking others from their sleep.

Chang Ming’an liked to sit on the windowsill at midday and watch Miss He’s window. He would see her draw back the curtains, still in a bathrobe, and comb her long, dark, curly hair by the light. Then she would close the curtains again. Soon after came the sound of heels on the pavement. She moved along the narrow alleys between the buildings, stepping carefully in those high heels to avoid the dirty puddles. The ends of her curly hair swayed at her waist with every step, and Chang Ming’an watched, entranced.

Chang Ming’an’s childhood friend lived next door to Miss He. One day, when he went to visit, he happened to meet her as she was leaving.

That day she wore a black cheongsam embroidered with begonia flowers. Her lips were as red as ripe cherries, and emerald-green earrings swayed against her neck. When she noticed the little boy staring at her, she smiled, took a tube of hawthorn slices from her sequined buckle bag, and placed it in his hand. Her voice was soft as water.

“Here, cut the brocade.”

He did not understand that it was Shanghainese, so he kept his head down and dared not look up. A pair of hands with red nail polish reached out and pressed the hawthorn slices into his palm.

Clutching them, Chang Ming’an ran home like the wind.

When his mother saw what he held, she asked, “Where did these hawthorn slices come from?”

Chang Ming’an answered happily, “The older sister from the next building gave them to me.”

His mother asked warily, “Which sister?”

He thought for a moment. “The one with the red lips.”

“You’re going to die,” Mrs. Chang said. She snatched the hawthorn slices from his hand and threw them into the trash, muttering under her breath, “That shameless slut who lives off men. She doesn’t even spare the children.”

Chang Ming’an understood none of what his mother said. He only stared at the discarded hawthorn slices and began to cry loudly.

The women in the apartment building all regarded Miss He as a monstrous threat, as if she could steal a man’s soul with a single blink or the flutter of an eyelash. The men treated her as an unspeakable mystery, able only to glance at her greedily as they passed.

After the scolding, Chang Ming’an never dared speak to her again. Still he often looked out the window and saw handsome young men standing downstairs from time to time, flowers in hand, calling her name. Admirers and suitors gathered around her like stars, yet she remained always beautiful, walking lightly in high heels, almost as if dancing, carefully circling the dirty puddles.

Later she moved away.

Talk in the hallway went on for a month. People said she had been pregnant and abandoned by her man. In the end everyone, whether sincerely or not, agreed that she had only gotten what she deserved.

The windowsill stood empty.

Chang Ming’an eventually left that dilapidated, dimly lit apartment building with his parents, and Miss He faded gradually from his memory. Until one night in his adolescence he suddenly dreamed of curly hair swaying around a slender waist cinched by a cheongsam. He woke with a start and found his pants wet.

When Chang Ming’an returned to the old house he was nearing thirty. The hallway was narrower and darker than he remembered, the bulbs overhead flickering. The whole neighborhood was scheduled for demolition in six months, and his mother had told him to come back and see whether he had left anything behind.

The place smelled of dust and long abandonment. The previous tenant had moved out half a month earlier, and the rooms were empty. Nothing remained.

Chang Ming’an stood by the window, lit a cigarette, and let it burn slowly to the end.

He had just finished a commonplace relationship. His former girlfriend had been a friend of a friend; they had met at a party, she had confessed first, and they had drifted naturally into dating, living together, and then an amicable parting. A faint emptiness still lingered. His mother kept urging him to settle down soon, and he would always smile good-naturedly and answer, “Mom, I know.”

After less than ten minutes in the old house he went downstairs. The alley was quiet, only one or two tenants passing now and then. The ground was uneven and puddled, so one had to step carefully to keep shoes clean. Streetlights glowed dimly, and the sound of televisions drifted from windows at intervals.

He was walking along when he suddenly heard the click of high heels at the far end of the road.

A figure approached from the distance. Chang Ming’an saw a woman in a striking cheongsam, waist slender, long curly hair cascading over her shoulders, high heels picking their way carefully around the puddles.

He stopped short, a chill running down his spine. His eyes fixed on the woman in the cheongsam. She kept her gaze lowered, intent on her steps. She looked to be in her early twenties, tall and slender, makeup exquisite. Her lips were as red as ripe cherries, and above the high collar a glimpse of fair neck shimmered under the streetlights. She was alluring and captivating, yet her long brows carried a touch of quiet spirit.

It was as if she had stepped straight out of memory.

Chang Ming’an’s heart pounded. He opened his mouth but let her brush past him. A faint perfume reached him, the cool, sharp fragrance of plum blossoms.

“Wait… wait a moment…”

He spoke too softly; she did not hear. He watched her walk farther and farther until she vanished into the shadows. Five minutes later a window in the building next door lit up, light filtering through thin lace curtains to cast a blurry silhouette. Chang Ming’an returned home as if his soul had left him.

They looked so alike, yet it could not be. The ages did not match, and the faces were different. Or were they? He could no longer be sure. Had the cheongsam he saw today been embroidered with bright red crabapple blossoms? Had the hand that once reached toward him carried that same delicate scent of plum?

Chang Ming’an fell asleep still turning the questions over. In his dream a small stretch of neck showed above a collar, dazzlingly white.