Page 6 - My FlipBook

My bus leaves in the late afternoon, and an hour later, it’s still
crawling in a procession of coal trucks that clog the roads. The
smell of exhaust and burning coal seeps into the bus. The air is
thick, and the spewing smokestacks of the refineries near the
highways are barely visible in the yellowy-gray smog. With
the traffic around the cities, the stops, and the transfers, it will
be at least a six-hour trip to Taiyuan where Mama, Baba and
Bao-bao live. Where Bao-bao lived.
Because of the fug of pollution, I can’t tell when the sun
goes down or when the day turns to dusk, but by the time
night falls we’ve gained speed. We pass several massive, well-lit
Sinopec gas stations with their rusty exercise equipment and
billboards with gory images of what could happen in a car acci-
dent if you don’t take care while driving.
People crowd onto the bus at the stations of towns and
small cities. At one stop, a pregnant woman waddles down
the aisle. I automatically stand to give her my seat. She smiles
gratefully, but moves one step past the seat I just vacated and
ushers a little girl in pigtails, who was hidden behind her, to
sit down. Immediately, I regret giving up my seat to this little
emperor. But then I see the mother’s protruding abdomen bump
against the girl’s head when the bus lurches on, and I remember
that I was once like that little girl—a first child showered with
attention, indulged, until I was pushed aside by a second child.
My brother. Who is dead.
What could have happened? I wonder and wonder, questions
stopping up my muddled feelings of bewilderment, old jealousies,
guilt that I’m not sadder. Was he hit by a car in traffic? Has he
been sick? What sort of terrible disease could strike so fast?
The last time I spoke with Mama, Bao-bao was due to take
the gaokao, the two-day, nine-hour entrance exam for college,

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