FIRST SNOW

IT was already pitch black outside, but there was still no snow on the ground. The weather forecast had said the snow would start sometime this evening, and Lei had been waiting for it anxiously. The temperature had dropped sharply since that morning as a cold front from Canada swept down the flat and vast Midwest plains. It was mid-November, and the snow would be the first of the season. Lei looked through the glass door that opened to the yard; the light from the lamp next to the sofa shone through the glass and projected on an area in the yard. There were a few scattered fallen leaves twisting and turning in the wind. For a while she imagined the snowflakes floating down and how different the yard would look when it was covered under the white snow. Then she caught her own reflection in the glass door; her face looked hollow and ghostly under the uneven illumination from the light behind her.

    Lei sighed and lowered the blinds, then went to the bedroom and picked up the dress she had laid on the bed earlier. The flimsy red silk felt slippery and cold, and the embroidered flora patterns looked a little too festive for such a quiet evening. The style was called “ChiPao,” popular in old ShangHai and somehow revived as a wedding fashion for its elegant slim cut and high collar that wrapped tightly around the neck. Ming insisted that she should wear the dress for the party. Professor Mann, the old chairman of his Department, was retiring and the new chairman, Professor Eves, was hosting a party to honor Professor Mann’s thirty years of service. As an assistant professor on the tenure track, Ming took the party seriously and told Lei that they should make their best appearances. Lei stood in front of the mirror and measured the dress against her upper body. She had not worn it since the wedding night, and that night seemed so long ago although she had been married less than a year. She had gained some weight, and she was afraid the dress might not fit anymore. In college, she had a figure that was the envy of her roommates. Even in those two years when she worked in the tallest building in her hometown, she always enjoyed wearing high heels and tight skirts so that she could walk through the marble lobby and carpeted corridors with confidence. After the wedding, after she left China and followed Ming to this college town in the Midwest, after life became a routine of cooking, cleaning and waiting for Ming to come home -- except for occasional social nights with other Chinese wives -- she started to care less and less about her looks.  Lei checked herself in the mirror carefully. There wasn’t a wrinkle on her face, and her long dark hair still fell straight and fluffy on her shoulders. She was only twenty-seven and her youth was still there. After putting on some makeup and doing her hair, she would be transformed to that young attractive woman once again. This thought brought her some faint excitement, as if she could relive those old college weekends when she and her roommates would dress up and go to the student hall for the weekly dance parties. But Lei did not particularly like the dress; she thought it made her stand out too much and look too Chinese. She had other dresses and nightgowns that would give her a much more Western and cosmopolitan look.

     She went back to the kitchen and took the dishes out of the oven and put them on the dining table. She also brought to a hard boil the chicken herb soup that had been simmering on the stove for a couple of hours. Ming was still in his study. He said another of his papers had just been accepted by one of the professional journals and he needed to make some changes. The door was firmly shut from the living room. He required absolute quiet when he worked. Whenever he walked into his study, Lei would retreat to the bedroom, to read a book or watch TV with the volume turned to the lowest. But today was a special day, and they should finish dinner earlier so that they could show up at the party on time. Lei knocked at his door. After she heard the squeaking of the chair and Ming’s footsteps, she quickly went back to the kitchen and started to ladle the soup into the bowls.

     Ming sat down at the dinner table without saying a word and drank the soup right away. Lei sat across the table and watched him. He had a prominent forehead and a square jaw. Like Lei he was also from the south but he had somehow acquired a short and stocky figure. The steam of the soup was fogging up his glasses, and she could see him sweating a bit. 

    “How is the paper coming along?” She asked, deciding to break the silence. Lately they talked less and less, and sometimes she found this wall between them unbearable.      

     “It is fine,” Ming answered.                                                                                                                        

     Lei knew that he was struggling hard at his job. The student evaluations from last semester were discouraging. They complained that Ming’s thick accent and unintelligible English often confused them. His exams were too hard. His lectures were dull and dry. Ming was upset and kept his face straight for a few days. It took a lot of effort for Lei to find this out. He mentioned that research still counted more than anything else in order to get tenured. He still had a chance. 

     Lei picked up her chopsticks and put some vegetables in her bowl. She did not really have much appetite after a long day of staying home.

    “The snow still has not started,” Lei changed the subject; her excitement could not be more obvious in her tone.

    “What is so good about snow?” Ming mumbled between his slurps. “When it starts to melt, everywhere is slushy and dirty.”

    “But I have never seen snow in my life. You know that it never snows in our city,” Lei insisted.

    “The real thing is never as good as what you have imagined.” Ming gave her an in-the-know smirk.

     He finished his soup and took a long breath. He seemed to have fully enjoyed it. Lei learned the recipe from his mother who, before the marriage, had given her a long lecture on how to take care of Ming. Seeing him loosening up and relaxing, Lei decided this was a good time to raise her objection.

    “Are you sure that you want me to wear that wedding dress?” she asked.

    “Why not?” Ming scooped the rice into his bowl without looking up.

    “The color is too bright.”

    “I do not see anything wrong with it.”

    “These days no one my age wears it other than in weddings. It may look too conspicuous at the party.”

    “Nonsense. Remember Professor Sanjeev’s wife Vanita? She even wears Sari at the Department’s barbeque.”

    Lei had met Vanita twice. Vanita smiled a lot and seemed to take great pride in her traditional costume, as if she was putting on an Indian culture show at those faculty events. Lei was not sure whether she liked Vanita or not. Lei wanted to argue with Ming more, but she realized that it would be all in vain. Once he set his mind on something, nothing could change him. Lei found out about his stubbornness only after they were married. She married him in a rush on New Year’s Eve after they met the summer that he finished his Ph.D. program. Their meeting was arranged since Ming’s mother worked in the same office with Lei’s aunt. Lei had already been informed of Ming’s credentials before the meeting. The fact that he had studied in the most prestigious universities in China and the US, the prospect of becoming a professor’s wife, his family background that matched hers, all these things convinced Lei’s entire family that Ming was a golden opportunity for her. At their first meeting, Lei noticed that Ming was aloof and did not talk much, but she took that as a sign of the depth of his personality.   

    But she still found it annoying that he was so insistent on her wearing the wedding dress for this party. The style of the dress had become a symbol of oriental femininity, and she was fully aware of her function for these parties since Ming needed her to help him to socialize and fit in with the faculty circle. Although Ming had lived in the States much longer than her, he still felt uncomfortable among Americans and tended to become quiet and withdrawn. Lei, on the other hand, spoke English fluently and was much more sociable. Her training in a foreign language institute and her two years in a joint-venture company contributed to these skills. Sometimes, she wondered, maybe that was exactly why he chose her as his wife so quickly when he had so many marriage choices back in China.

    After dinner, Ming went back to his office. Lei put all the dishes in the sink and turned on the tap. Through the windowpane she could see the branches of the apple tree in her yard; the last few leaves had already turned yellow and were fluttering in the wind. They probably would not be able to bear a snowstorm and would soon fall. Lei remembered an O’Henry story about the last leaf left on a branch, and the melancholy mood of the story took hold of her. She had been an avid reader of American literature in her college days. O’Henry, Dressier, Fitzgerald, Faulkner, Her college library only had these classics. They were books about poverty, depression, and disillusionment of American dreams, but they still opened such a new world to her and made her long to come to the States. This urge became a lot stronger after her best friend in college moved to New York and sent over many pictures in which she either posed in front of Statue of Liberty or looked thrilled under the formidable skyscrapers. The thought of spending her whole life in an overcrowded Chinese city and never being able to live anywhere else scared Lei, so when Ming showed up that summer in her aunt’s house and appeared more handsome than what she had expected, she decided she would not let him slip away.

    Her thoughts drifted away, and after a while the drain got clogged and the hot water started to fill the sink. Her hands felt good in the warmth of the water. After almost eight months since she came to the States, her life seemed to be stuck in a rut again. First she put off her plan of going to graduate school because Ming needed her as a housewife during the first year of his tenure track position. Then the initial excitement of living in the States quickly subsided after she got used to everything and found out there was really not much to do in such a small college town. But everything has its price, and she had already told herself again and again that if it were not for their marriage she would never have the chance to live in this country. Whether she was happy or not was simply a matter of adjustment. Maybe, she thought, things would change. Ming would get his tenure, and she would go back to school again and find a job and make new friends. Happiness would be just a matter of patience, and time too.        

Professor Eve’s house was merely a mile down the street from where Ming and Lei lived. It was a moderately sized, one-story redbrick house, not extravagant but certainly bigger than Ming and Lei’s rented home. As the street got further from the highway the houses increased in size and grandeur; the end of the street met with a pond and woods, and beyond that were endless rolling hills.

    There were hardly any parking spots left near the house, and they could already hear noise from inside as they stood on the front steps. Professor Eves opened the door and greeted them after they rang the bell. Lei had met him once before at the department barbeque and had a good impression of him. He was in his late forties, had a benign face and pepper-white hair. A gray sports coat with a light blue shirt made him look even younger. Ming was wearing his dark suit and red tie, an outfit he always wore for formal occasions. He appeared overdressed and was dwarfed by Professor Eves. Lei heard that Professor Eves was divorced not long ago, but she could not detect any sadness in his composure.

    After they exchanged handshakes, Lei took off her coat and handed it to Professor Eves. Her shining red dress was suddenly fully exposed. This was the moment she dreaded since she knew it would catch the attention of the party crowd. She was not a shy person, but she still did not like to be in the spotlight at a faculty party. 

    “Oh, Lena. What a lovely dress.” Vanita said as she came across the living room. Lei had been using an English name since she came to the States and her Chinese name was unknown outside her household. Vanita was wearing a Sari again, but it was in a different color from the last one Lei remembered. The chiffon drapery of her sari fluttered while Vanita’s husband Sanjeev followed behind her. “Ming. You are a lucky guy to have such a beautiful wife,” she said to Ming. Sanjeev also acknowledged Ming and joined the crowd. 

     Lei smiled and felt that her own smile was just as plastic as Vanita’s. Vanita and Sanjeev seemed to be on the opposite sides of the personality spectrum. Sanjeev was mellow and gentle, and Vanita was always high-strung, opinionated and extremely social. Mrs. Mann came to the circle and looked at both Lei and Vanita adoringly. “You both have the most interesting dresses.” Then she held hands with both Lei and Vanita and led them away from their husbands. “Let’s join the ladies first,” she said. Mrs. Mann was a large bosomed woman, and her seniority allowed her to play the matriarchal role in the gatherings of faculty and their families.

    The presence of both Vanita and Lei triggered a conversation on ethnic fashions among the wives. One of them had recently traveled to Thailand and raved about the hand-made Thai silk. She directed the attention of the group to a young woman who had been in and out of the kitchen and helping to serve the snacks. The woman was wearing a full-length dress made of fabric from the Andes. Someone asked who she was and it turned out she was Professor Eves’ new girlfriend, although she had not been formally introduced to any of the wives with that title yet.

   “I heard she used to be his student,” Vanita whispered.

   The group fell silent for a second. One or two of the women frowned as if they were afraid that the same thing could happen to their husbands.

   “Where was his previous wife?” Lei broke the silence. She regretted it as soon as she uttered the question. She did not want to sound too nosy.

   “Linda? She left Donald for some doctor in New York,” Mrs. Mann said in a matter-of-fact tone. “She got custody of both kids.”

    “Who would have thought She’d do that?” One elder woman said, who apparently knew Linda before.

    “They had marriage problems for years,” Mrs. Mann said defensively. “It was not a secret.”

    In the spring semester Professor Eves had had a talk with Ming after student evaluations had been completed. Lei did not know the details of their conversation, but she knew that Ming had felt humiliated and was quite distraught afterward. Since then Ming had no good things to say about Professor Eves. But Lei did not want to pass her judgment too soon. The information only made her more curious about Professor Eves.

    From the corner of her eyes Lei noticed that Ming was left alone again after Professor Sanjeev left him. He did not seem to want to come over and in the ladies and looked a little awkward. So Lei excused herself from the wives and walked over to Ming.

    “Where is Sanjeev?” Lei asked.

    “Kissing the chairman’s ass.” Ming’s voice was low but full of sarcasm. Lei looked around and made sure that no one heard him, and then she realized they were speaking Chinese and no one would understand them anyway. There were three assistant professors on tenure track this year. Although the university was no ivy league, the historical tenure rate was only fifty percent. The job market in academia had been tight for a number of years and the competition for tenures was fierce. Sanjeev was also on the tenure track and had joined the department a year earlier than Ming. He got along with everyone and was well known for his amiable personality. Both his teaching and research, though not of extraordinary quality, were well received in the department. The third professor on the tenure track, as Lei heard, was a new American guy who just graduated from Berkeley and had joined the faculty that fall. Ming said he did not know much about the new guy but the very fact of him being a real American posed a bigger threat than Sanjeev.  

    They went to the dining room and got some snacks, then they returned to the living room where most of people were scattered around. Ming did not want to enter any circle of people on his own, but no one was coming over to join them either. Vanita was still hanging with the wives and chatting with all her vigor. Lei felt a little pathetic about Ming, and about herself too. Before she could dwell more on this, Ming walked away after he told her that he needed to go to the bathroom and that he would also get some drinks on his way back.      

    On her own Lei stood next to the fireplace and decided to check the framed pictures on the mantel. There was a family shot in which Lei recognized Professor Eves and his ex-wife as well as two children, both of whom were in their early teens. It was an outdoor shot, probably at a picnic or on a camping trip. All of them were beaming under the direct sunlight. They looked like the kind of wholesome family that would appear in department store catalogues. Even a marriage like this could fall apart, Lei thought. She looked more carefully at the wife, but her joyful expression did not reveal much to Lei. Ming once told Lei that he did not appreciate American women: “They talk and laugh too loud. They do not know the virtue of endurance and bashfulness. For them, it is all about ‘me’.” Lei could not believe that the woman in the picture would run away and betray the family just because of her own selfishness. Every marriage had its dark side. Lei sighed. When she turned back she found out that a young-looking guy with dark curly hair was standing right in front of her.

   “Hello, you must be Lena.”  The guy grinned at her. He was holding a glass of wine and his hazel eyes looked slightly tipsy.

    Lei was surprised. Who would know her, the secluded housewife? “How do you know my name?” She asked

   “Ming has your picture in his office.”    

    Although he was wearing jeans and a corduroy jacket, there was a certain confidence in his forwardness that convinced Lei that he could not be one of the graduate students. So she took her bet on the third assistant professor.

    “You must be Professor Atkins.”

    “Call me Jeff.” He tried to give Lei a casual and charming smile. But he stared at her dress. “Chipao.” He was apparently knowledgeable about her dress. “I always think Chipao is the best Chinese invention in fashion. Its cut suits Asian women so well.”

     That last sentence alarmed her. She was not sure how she should answer back. She was always a little uneasy with white men who had Asian fetishes. In the joint-venture company where she had worked as a translator, there were a few American expatriates, mostly middle-aged and rather unattractive. But half of them were married with young beautiful Chinese wives. Her irritation was combined with such a jealousy when she saw her other Chinese female colleagues displayed excessive interest and tried eagerly to make friends with them. She was determined that if she would use marriage to get out of China at least he should be a Chinese man. 

    “How are you such an expert about traditional Chinese dresses?” She asked him.

    Jeff did not seem to detect the little attitude she was putting on. “Actually I had a Chinese girlfriend in graduate school.”

    Somehow that confession made Lei a little nervous. She folded her hands in front of her chest as she suddenly became aware of the sexual tension between them. 

    “She had the same dress, but in blue and it had these white plum flowers embroidered on the front,” Jeff continued. “She didn’t wear it often though.” 

    “It is such an antique now. No one wears it in China these days,” Lei explained.

    “But I always liked her wearing it.” Jeff seemed to be recalling something distant in his memory. “Well, it’s all history now.” He shrugged and looked back at Lei.   

    “What happened then?”

    “Long story.” Jeff sighed. “We met in a Yoga class in the campus gym. She was from Beijing and was also studying at Cal…We even lived together for two years.”

    “I am sorry.” Lei tried to sound sympathetic, but she was already occupied by a curiosity about the mysterious Chinese girl. 

    “One day when I got home all her stuff was gone. I called and called but all she said was that I didn’t understand her.”

     Lei tried to imagine what the girl would be like. She searched for an image in her mind. She must have short hair and high cheeks. Girls from the capital city were always more independent and strong.  

     “What was she like?”

     “She actually looked like you.” Jeff looked at her with a gaze that made Lei blush. She almost stepped back but she was already against the wall.

     “Maybe in your eyes all Asian women look alike.”

     “No, no. I know the difference. She really looks like you.”

     There was something very tender and touching in Jeff’s voice that made Lei let down her guard.

     “She really broke my heart,” Jeff mumbled. “That’s probably the main reason why I left California.”

     Lei was not used to a male stranger so easily revealing his emotions to her. She wished she could do more, like hold his hands or something; she felt that some strange bond was growing between them and his hazel eyes suddenly looked both endearing and intriguing, but all she could say was the same sentence.

    “I am really sorry to hear that.”

    Jeff took a sip of the wine and seemed to pull himself out of his nostalgic mood. “This is a quiet town, isn’t it?”

    “This is the only part of America I know of…” Before Lei could finish her sentence, Professor Eves was in the center of the room and asking the crowd to quiet down. Then he made an announcement about the small ceremony for Professor Mann. Everyone was to congregate in the living room and Lei saw Vanita checking out both her and Jeff with her big round eyes. Ming was in the flow of people moving towards the living room; she quickly excused herself from Jeff and joined Ming.

     There were several speeches from Professor Mann’s students and colleagues, who praised him as a great teacher, an accomplished researcher and a good leader. In the end he received a plaque from Professor Eves during a long round of applauses. The crowd dispersed again and people returned to chatting and socializing. But Lei didn’t talk to Jeff for the rest of the party. She stayed with Ming and dared not to look for Jeff in the crowd, although a few times she thought she caught his quick glimpses. He must have been observing her, and this thought made her a little panicky. She tried to nod or smile in the most elegant and attractive way she could come up with. Ming appeared a little distracted throughout the rest of the party. He smiled mechanically and talked as little as he could. Lei took over most of the conversation when they were talking as a couple with other people.

   

They waited to leave the party until half of the crowd had already left. Ming kept his face stiff and sped their car all the way home. Lei looked out the window and stayed quiet. It was almost midnight and there was neither star nor moon outside. The dark silhouettes of the houses passed by like elapsing shadows.

    When they got back to the house, Ming brushed his teeth and went straight to bed. Lei took off her dress, folded it and put it away on the top shelf of the closet. She did not want to wear it anymore, not for a long time. She thought Ming was already asleep and she slipped into the bed hoping that she would not wake him up. But as soon as she lay down, he asked a question without even opening his eyes.

    “What did you and Professor Atkins talk about?” 

    He sounded so calm, so casual, as if he was just asking about what they would eat for dinner. Lei did not feel like giving him a report and said briefly: “Nothing much. He introduced himself and we chatted a bit.”

    “Your face was quite red when I saw you.”

    “It must have been the wine.” Lei wanted to end this conversation and did not think much about what she had just said.

    “You had not drunk any wine at the time.”

    She was caught, but Ming still appeared calm and patient. Lei lied quickly: “I took a few sips from Professor Atkins’ glass.”

    “Oh, really? That sounds very intimate to me.”

    Ming seemed to b. Lei’s heart wrenched and she gripped the blanket tighter.  

    “These white devils,” he said in his low voice. “Why do Asian chicks always go for them?”

    Lei could not say anything. For a long while Ming did not say anything either after the last statement and Lei thought that Ming must be exhausted and had given up his mental tortures.

    “I hate them. I hate them all,” He said.

    Ming’s voice was so low that he sounded like he was talking to himself. But the words struck her and made her shiver in an anonymous fear. She stayed still at her side of bed. The next few minutes passed in silence. Then she started to feel Ming’s hand touching her shoulder. He was apparently trying to pull her over to him and was moving his legs over.

    “Ming, I am too tired,” Lei begged.

     But Ming did not stop. His body jerked and he rolled over and pushed Lei to the edge of the bed. One of his hands was already traveling to her bra and it was gripping her breast. The other hand was stripping off her underwear. 

    “Please, Ming.”    

    Before she could react, he’d already entered her and started to thrust back and forth.                       

    “You are mine. You know that!” Lei closed her eyes and gritted her teeth and tried her best to stop the scream from her throat.

     Ming started to snore quickly after he rolled back to his side. Lei stayed awake in the bed. She thought about that fateful summer evening when she met Ming and her subsequent long-distance courting with him. She thought about that wedding night, how she had had the first sex with Ming and felt this strange dislocation as if she was not herself but someone else she managed to slip to. She thought about the sounds of her city she heard while she was lying awake on the bed with Ming next to her: the night train passing the tracks, a baby’s cries, the rustling of the trees. She thought about how melancholy she was that night as if she already had known what a price she paid to leave her old life. She thought about Professor Eves and his ex-wife whose face she knew only vaguely from the picture. She also thought about Jeff and his hazel eyes. She even thought about that girl from Beijing she did not even have a face for. Where would she be now? Was she married? Was she happy?   

    After an hour she got up and went to the living room and sat down in the sofa. It was unusually quiet. She could hear no noise except for the low humming of the refrigerator. The usual noise of the occasional passing cars from the nearby highway had disappeared completely. The early wind had also stopped. Tears filled up her eyes and turned into a quiet sob. After another ten minutes she stopped crying and just stared at the emptiness feeling numb and exhausted.

    She went to the kitchen to get a glass of water. There were traces of ice on the windowpane. She looked outside and saw snowflakes floating slowly and freely in the air. A sudden excitement surged and she went back to the living room and opened the curtain. Through the glass door she could see more snowflakes. They seemed to have multiplied infinitely and were taking over everything in their way. Lei’s eyes followed one snowflake after another until each of them fell quietly on the cushion of the snow that was accumulating steadily. The dreamy movement of the snowflakes put her in a trance.

    She opened the glass door and walked out into the yard. She was still in her pajamas but the cold air did not stop her. She knelt down and put her bare hands on the snow; then sank them all the way down until they were completely buried. Her palms felt a burning sensation as if thousands of needles were pricking her hands. She shivered more. The snowflakes were all over her head and her body and some of them melted and left wet spots on her skin and on her pajamas. She scooped up a handful of snow and pressed them into a snowball. She stood up and threw the snowball toward the wood fence that enclosed the backyard. The ball swooshed and splashed and left a white mess on the wall, which she could barely see under the dim light. Then she squatted down and made a bigger snowball. This time she hurled it with all her strength and tried to throw it out of the backyard and over the fence. The snowball made a parabolic curve and disappeared behind the fence. The snow was falling more intensely, and Lei could imagine them falling beyond the fence and on the rolling hills and on the vast open Midwest prairies. Maybe tomorrow the world would be different, and she could not wait to see it.