A Map for the Missing(22)

“I told you there wouldn’t be anyone here at this hour,” Yitian’s mother said. They’d checked each of the four buildings in the police station and found all the doors locked.

“This is the police station, right?” he asked the single other occupant, an old woman sweeping circles around the courtyard. She hadn’t greeted them when they entered and now eyed him suspiciously.

“What else would it be?”

“We’re here to report a missing person,” he tried.

Instead of a response, she looked him up and down. He repeated himself.

“They’re all napping at this hour,” she grunted at last.

“When will the break end?”

She shrugged.

“Why are you looking at us like that?” Yitian’s mother snapped. “Have we done anything to you?”

“Where are you two from?”

“Tang Family Village. We’re from here, okay, sister? Satisfied? Or would you like me to tell you the exact directions to our house?”

“Even him?” The woman’s eyes narrowed.

His mother stuck her hand through the loop of his arm. “He’s my son.” She pulled him away from the cleaning lady, muttering under her breath about people who’d never learned any manners.

The villagers hadn’t been as rude as this woman, but they’d hardly offered him any more help. After Second Uncle, there’d been more visits from other neighbors, all of whom seemed to follow the same lines of questioning, as if they were actors with the same script in the movie set his home had become. His life in America, what his salary was, what his house looked like, did they have a television there, why hadn’t he and Mali had a child? Then he would have to listen to each guest’s recounting of their children’s accomplishments, one story bleeding into the next without distinction. Each visit had brought him an uneasy feeling of pride at the way they knew him now and shame at that very feeling. As recently as a year ago, he and Mali had bought all their clothes secondhand (he’d casually mentioned this to his mother once, and she’d burst into tears, before seeming to ignore the fact entirely). He had the eerie sensation that he was being trailed by a ghost twin, one who’d had all the successes the villagers congratulated him for, whom he felt proud of but couldn’t possibly be.

When he brought up his father, they shook their head in disappointment and marveled at how unlikely his disappearance was. He’d expected them to rush out and offer their help. Was this how the country had changed in these years, everyone worrying only for themselves? They were like Americans would be, each family hidden in their own cul-de-sac, willing to break its boundaries only if it demanded no inconvenience to themselves. Yitian had hoped for a response more like the time when he was a child and their neighbor Auntie Shan hadn’t come home in the evening for dinner. She’d been in the early stages of dementia, a word he learned only later. He remembered how his grandfather and mother had rushed out with the other villagers to scour the area until the old woman was returned safely home.

His mother had warned him that the police station wouldn’t be helpful at this time of day, but he’d insisted on going immediately. They’d already lost the day before because the village office car was out on official use. (“My ass,” his mother said. “That new village chief just uses that car as if it’s his own personal vehicle. He was probably off somewhere with his mistress.”)

Now, he felt foolish for expecting more than this. He didn’t want to admit to himself the images he’d had in his mind, of bursting urgently into the police station, rapidly explaining his emergency to the officers, all of them immediately rushing up to take his case. They’d search the surrounding villages, knocking on doors, hanging up posters bearing his father’s picture and description. Faceless villagers would call in with their tips. He realized, embarrassed, that this image had come from an American series he’d seen on television years ago, which followed detectives as they searched for missing children in the early hours after a case. Watching them, he’d felt a sense of efficacy and competence, that it was only a matter of time before the children were returned to the warm beds in the homes where they belonged.



* * *



—

At two thirty, an officer finally arrived, stomping out the dregs of a cigarette as he mumbled an excuse about a problem elsewhere in town that he’d been dealing with. His hair stood out in tufts from the back of his head and bits of yellow crust still stuck to his eyelashes. He took them to a room whose walls were papered with notices and directives, so many that the edges overlapped. All the desks, however, were mysteriously bare. In the far corner was the only space that showed signs of life, fluffy leather sofas surrounding a coffee table covered with majiang tiles and small hills of discarded sunflower seeds.

Yitian shivered at the cold emitting from the cement walls.

“Well, so, can I help you?”

The officer gestured for them to sit down at a desk in the corner. He had the thick, mottled skin of a person who’d spent their entire life working in the sun. Even in this police station, hardly functional, he looked out of place.

“My father is missing.”

“How do you mean?” The officer appeared unconcerned. He sat back in his chair, folded his hands, and cupped them under his paunch.