Pain and Parting

"The birds have vanished into the sky, and only echoes remain." suggested Suzhen.

Mao Jing shook his head without looking up. "Pain and parting--too melancholic. The mood doesn't suit that of the previous line, it's too mournful. The poetry you come up with is always so melancholic, sometimes I wonder if Wanwan is bullying you behind my back."

Suzhen was sitting across from Mao Jin as he practiced his calligraphy, working on the pair of baby shoes she was making. She was embroidering a scroll of blue flowers along the side of one tiny shoe.

Wanwan, who was sweeping the courtyard nearby, gave an outraged gasp and retorted indignantly, "Mao Gongzi, you can't wrongfully accuse me like that! Me, bully her? Why, I take such good care of Madame. Look at how her cheeks have grown a bit rounder, and there's more colour in her face now."

Raising her head, a shadow of a smile flitted across Suzhen's lips. "Wanwan is the most devoted maid one could ask for. If anything, Mao Gongzi, you are the one bullying me."

Mao Jin quickly lifted the brush off the paper before it could leave a blot. "What, me?" he demanded.

Suzhen sewed industriously. "Yes, you. Come, you can't deny you're always teasing me."

He folded his sleeves back with dignity. "I, Mao Jin, have always behaved myself as a gentleman. Since when have I teased you?"

"Just the other day you said you would write a poem about me, comparing me to a snail crawling along the edge of a pond, just because I was walking so slowly in the courtyard."

He waved that away. "I meant that in a purely artistic form, to capture the graceful leisure of your pace. Didn't I, Wanwan?"

But he appealed to the wrong person. Wanwan, who was sweeping the courtyard, only sniffed pointedly, still offended at him.

"Life is full of pain and parting, anyway." Suzhen said casually. "It is a truth one cannot hide from."

Mao Jin glanced at her for the first time, but she was not looking at him. His tone was light enough when he replied. "You sound like my mother, now. I believe the temple would be very happy to have you, Madame Bai, and you might enjoy being locked up inside."

"You're still young," Suzhen replied sweetly, with maddening superiority. "And you obviously have never loved before. One day, Mao Gongzi, you will meet a maiden who teaches you to love. And with love comes pain, and the fear of parting."

She knew, from the corner of her eye, that the brush had paused again, and smiled to herself.

With a sigh, Mao Jin dipped his brush into the ink once more. "Fine, I'm young and inexperienced. But what then does that make you, my dear Madame Bai? I wouldn't dare to call you old, but--" He paused significantly.

Suzhen's eyes twinkled, more from the private amusement she had knowing that Mao Jin had no idea how very old she really was. With a dramatic sigh, she conceded humbly, "If you must remind me, it is indeed a fact that I am much older than you, Mao Gongzi."

There was a clattering sound and they both turned to see Wanwan drop the broom with a scandalized expression. She snatched it up hastily, glaring at Mao Jin with a peculiar ferocity, and went back to sweeping so furiously that the dried leaves flew wildly about her feet.

"That's not the first time Wanwan has glared at me like that," Mao Jin mused. "I wonder if I should start testing my food with a silver needle."

The brush flicked delicately, finishing a graceful tail on a word. There was a pleasant silence as they both worked quietly, until eventually Suzhen remarked, "You don't often talk about your mother. Did she enter the temple when you were very young?"

Mao Jin's hand stopped as he was about to set the brush down on the paper. "Mother was a gentle soul, but she had no backbone. Even the servants in the manor were disrespectful to her, though they never dared to be rude in front of my father. Since I was a boy, I knew that her dream was to enter the temple where she could pass her days in peace."

Suzhen looked thoughtful. She thought of her mountain, of the whispering trees and the animals playing in the shadows and the long, peaceful afternoons dreaming in the sun on her favourite rock.

"And she did. When I was sent to study for the civil examinations Father allowed her to enter the temple."

"And your father, then?" Suzhen asked innocently.

His face grew cold. "My father is happy, I have no doubt. He has been getting more and more powerful ever since he managed to marry my sister to Lord Yang. That is the only thing he has ever cared for. Who knows, I may get a message one day calling me back when he decides I might come in useful. What an honour that would be, for a concubine's son," he said bitterly.

"Yes, I've eaten his bread, lived on his money, I have no claim to anything of my own. I owe him the debt of having brought me up, but other than that there is no love lost between us. He was annoyed with Mother's piety, saying it made her useless, and he often caned me for being slow and timid as a child. I know it is a sin to be unfilial, but I only remember that my mother cried herself to sleep at night because of him."

"I am sorry," Suzhen said slowly. "I have never known parents, so I cannot understand your pain."

Mao Jin smiled. "Oh, don't feel bad. I did not tell you this intending you to feel sorry for me. I'm not sure why I told you this, even. After all, what does it matter to anyone but myself? There's nothing mysterious about it."

"We all have our mysteries," Suzhen said gently. "They make us who we are. Of course they matter."

He picked up his brush again, with a more carefree expression on his face. "You've been pretty mysterious yourself, Madame Bai. I won't press you to tell me anything you don't wish to, but you do have someone you hope to find after you give birth to your child, I believe."

"If you're going to continue to stay here, I will have to make provisions for your child's education, and I'm not sure if you will approve of that." he added, jokingly. "You always say I'm young and inexperienced, after all."

Suzhen laid down her needle. "I am indeed searching for someone."

She chose her words carefully. "A monk, named Fahai."

It was the first time she had spoken of anything from her past.

Looking up, she met Mao Jin's eyes and immediately snapped, "No. It's not what you think."

"I never said anything," he retorted hastily, lowering his gaze. Suzhen glowered, ruffled at the very idea of Fahai being possibly mistaken as her husband.

"But he knows where the father of my child is. So the first thing I must do once I have borne my child is to find him."

There was a faraway look in her eyes, even as her hand caressed her stomach.

"Fahai," repeated Mao Jin thoughtfully.