Shanghai Girls (Shanghai Girls 1)

“I pulled them out of the trash,” Mama announces.

I slip down next to May. I can’t believe Mama is willing to ship us to America to cure my father’s and her problems. But then isn’t that the kind of thing Chinese parents have done with worthless daughters for thousands of years—abandoned them, sold them, used them?

Seeing the looks of betrayal and fear on our faces, Mama hurries on. “We’re going to trade in your tickets to America and buy passage to Hong Kong for all of us. We’ve got three days to find a ship. Hong Kong is a British colony, so we don’t have to worry about the Japanese attacking there. If we decide it’s safe to come back onto the mainland, we’ll take the ferry or train to Canton. Then we’ll go to Yin Bo, your father’s home village.” Her jade bracelet hits the side table with a resolute thunk. “The Green Gang won’t find us there.”

Moon Sisters

THE NEXT MORNING, May and I start out for the Dollar Steamship Line’s office, hoping to exchange our tickets—from Shanghai to Hong Kong, from Hong Kong to San Francisco, and from San Francisco to Los Angeles—for just four tickets to Hong Kong. Nanking Road and the area around the racecourse remain closed so workers can clear away the mangled corpses and body parts, but this is the least of the city’s concerns. Thousands upon thousands of refugees continue to arrive, trying to stay ahead of the advancing Japanese. So many infants have been left to die on the streets by desperate parents that the Chinese Benevolent Association has established a special “baby patrol” to pick up the forsaken remains, pile them onto trucks, and take them to the countryside to be burned.

But for all the people coming into the city, thousands more try to leave. Many of my countrymen take trains back to their home villages in the interior. Friends we’ve known in the cafés—writers, artists, and intellectuals—make choices that will determine the rest of their lives: to go to Chungking, where Chiang Kai-shek has established his wartime capital, or to Yunnan to join the Communists. The wealthiest families—foreign and Chinese—leave by international steamers, which chug defiantly past the Japanese warships anchored off the Bund.

We wait for hours in a long queue. By five o’clock, we’ve moved perhaps ten feet. We return home with nothing resolved. I’m worn out; May looks distraught and depleted. Baba spent the day visiting friends, hoping to borrow money to help with our escape, but in these suddenly uncertain times, who can afford to be generous to an ill-fated man? The trio of toughs isn’t surprised by our lack of progress, but they’re hardly happy. Even they seem unnerved by the chaos surrounding us.

That night the house jumps from explosions in Chapei and Hongkew. Billowing ashes from these neighborhoods mingle with the smoke from the baby fires and the great pyres the Japanese use to burn their own dead.

IN THE MORNING, I get up quietly so I won’t disturb my sister. Yesterday she accompanied me without complaint. But a few times, when she thought I wasn’t looking, I’d caught her rubbing her temples. Last night she’d taken some aspirin and promptly thrown them up. She must have a concussion. I hope it’s mild, but how can I know for sure? At the very least, after everything that’s happened the last two days, she needs to sleep, because today is going to be another hard one. Tommy Hu’s funeral is at ten.

I go downstairs and find Mama in the salon. She motions for me to join her. “Here’s a little money.” An unusual steeliness has taken over her voice. “Go out and bring back some sesame cakes and dough sticks.” This is more than we’ve eaten for breakfast since the morning our lives changed. “We should eat well. The funeral—”

I take the money and leave the house. I hear the din from naval guns bombarding our shore positions, the incessant rattle of machine-gun and rifle fire, explosions in Chapei, and battles raging in outlying districts. Pungent ashes from last night’s funerary fires blanket the city so clothes that were hung out to dry will need to be rewashed, stoops swept, and cars doused. My throat chokes on the taste. Plenty of people crowd the street. War may be happening, but we all have things we need to do. I walk to the corner, but instead of doing Mama’s errands I board a wheelbarrow to take me to Z.G.’s apartment. I may have acted girlishly before, but that was one moment out of years of friendship. He has to have some affection for May and me. Surely he’ll help us find a way to put our lives back together.

I knock on his door. When no one answers, I go back downstairs and find his landlady in the central courtyard.

“He’s gone,” she says. “But what do you care? Your beautiful-girl days are over. Do you think we can hold back the monkey people forever?

Once they have control, no one will need or want your beautiful-girl calendars.” Her hysteria grows. “Those monkey people might want you for something else though. Is that what you want for you and your sister?”

“Just tell me where he is,” I say wearily.

“He left to join the Communists,” she yaps, each syllable coming out like a bullet.

“He wouldn’t leave without saying good-bye,” I say, doubtful.

The old woman cackles. “What a stupid girl you are! He left without paying his rent. He left behind his paints and brushes. He left without taking a single thing.”

I bite my lip to keep from crying. I have to focus on my own survival now.

Still mindful of my money, I hire a wheelbarrow to take me home, squeezing on with three other riders. As we bump along th

e road, I make a mental list of people who might help us. The men we dance with? Betsy? One of the other artists we pose for? But everyone has their own worries.

I return to an empty house. I’ve been gone so long I missed going to Tommy’s funeral.

May and Mama come home a couple of hours later. They’re both dressed in funeral white. May’s eyes are as swollen as overripe peaches from crying, and Mama looks old and tired, but they don’t ask where I was or why I didn’t go to the memorial. Baba isn’t with them. He must have lingered with the other fathers at the funeral banquet.

“How was it?” I ask.

May shrugs, and I don’t press. She leans against the doorjamb, crosses her arms, and stares at her feet. “We have to go back to the docks.”

I don’t want to go out. I’m heartsick over Z.G. I want to tell May he’s gone, but what good will it do? I despair over what’s happening to us. I want to be rescued. If not that, then I want to go back to bed, lie under the covers, and sob until I have no tears left. But I’m May’s older sister. I have to be braver than my emotions. I have to help us fight our bad fates. I take a deep breath and stand. “Let’s go. I’m ready.”

We return to the Dollar Steamship Line. The queue moves today, and when we get to the front we understand why. The clerk is useless. We show him our tickets, but exhaustion has robbed him of grammar and his temper.

“What you want me do with these?” he demands loudly.

“Can we exchange them for four tickets to Hong Kong?” I ask, sure that he’ll see this as a good deal for the company.

He doesn’t answer. Instead, he waves to the people behind us. “Next!”