Big Breasts & Wipe Hips: A Novel

Shangguans we were like a herd of sheep. Now there are few of us left.”
    Jintong forced himself to ask, “What about Eighth Sister?” With a sigh, she gave him an embarrassed look, as if begging for forgiveness.
    Even at the age of twenty, Yunuwas still like a little girl, a frightened, timid little girl. She’d always been like a chrysalis, spending her life in a cocoon, never wanting to cause the family any trouble. During the gloomy, rainy months of summer, she listened sorrowfully to the sound of Mother out in the yard throwing up. Thunder rolled off in the distance, the wind rustled leaves on the trees, the burnt odor of crackling lightning was in the air, but the sounds weren’t loud enough to cover up the retching noise outside, and none of the smells masked the stench of her vomit. The sound of the beans falling into the water went straight to the girl’s heart. How she wished it would stop, but at the same time she wanted it to continue forever. She was disgusted by the smell of Mother’s stomach juices and blood, but at the same time grateful for it. When Mother crushed the beans in the mortar, she felt as if it were her heart being mashed. And when Mother handed her the bowl of beans, with their raw, cold, sticky odor, hot tears rolled out of her sightless eyes and her lovely mouth twitched with each spoonful of the gooey mix. The enormous sense of gratitude in her heart went unspoken.
    The previous year, on the morning of the seventh day of the seventh month, as Mother was leaving for the mill,
Yun ü
had blurted out, “What do you look like, Mother?” Reaching out with her fair hands, she’d said, “Let me feel your face — please.”
    With a sigh, Mother said, “Foolish little girl, bad as the times are, is that all you want?”
    Mother brought her face up to Eighth Sister’s hands and let her stroke it with her soft fingers, which had a damp, cold odor. “Go wash your hands, Yun
ü
. There’s water in the basin.”
    After Mother left, Eighth Sister climbed down off the bed. She heard Parrot singing happily in his cradle, mixed with the chirps of birds, the sound of snails dragging slime across the bark of trees, and swallows making a nest in the eaves. Sniffing the air, she followed the smell of clear water over to the basin, where she bent down. Her lovely face was reflected in the water, just as Natasha’s image had once found Jintong’s eyes, but she couldn’t see it. Not many people had seen the face of this Shangguan girl. She had a high nose, fair skin, soft, yellow hair, and a long, thin neck, like that of a swan. When she felt the cold water on the tip of her nose, and then her lips, she buried her face in it. The rush of water up her nose made her choke, bringing her back to reality, and she jerked her head up out of the water. There was a buzzing in her ears, her nose ached and felt swollen. As soon as she smacked her ears with her hands to clear out the water, she heard the chirping of parrots in the tree and the cries of Parrot Han for his eighth aunt. She walked over to the tree, where she reached up and rubbed his drippy nose. Then, without a word, she groped her way out the gate.
    Mother reached up and wiped away the tears with the back of her hand. “Your eighth sister left because she thought she was a burden,” she said softly. “Your eighth sister was sent to us by her father, the Dragon King. But her time was up, and now she has returned to the Eastern Ocean to continue her life as the Dragon Princess …”
    Jintong wanted to console Mother, but could not find the words. He merely coughed to mask the pain in his heart.
    Just then there was a knock at the door. Mother trembled briefly, before hiding the mortar and saying to Jintong, “Open the door. See who it is.”
    Jintong opened the door. It was the woman from the ferry boat. She was standing timidly at the door holding her lute. “Are you Jintong?” she asked in a tiny, mosquito-like voice.
    Shangguan Xiangdi had come home.
8
    Five years later, on a winter morning, as Xiangdi lay waiting to die, she suddenly climbed out of bed. Her nose had rotted away, leaving behind only a black hole, and she was blind in both eyes. Nearly all her hair had fallen out, and all that remained were a few rust-colored wisps here and there on her shriveled scalp. After groping her way over to the standing cabinet, she climbed onto a stool and took down her lute, the box of which had been smashed. She then groped her way