Part One.
1.
Learning Chinese isn't hard.
But I was. Constantly.
I met Chen Dongyu in a bookstore. She approached me and, as soon as I saw her, I was glad she did. One look at her and I was smitten. But, here's the thing, I don't know if I'd have had the balls to approach her. But she took my balls and drained them day after day. I never knew that someone could do that. Especially a girl like her.
She didn't seem like the type and I loved that.
"Can you recommend me any books?"
Now, many people dislike the classic Chinese accent. I love it. I also love the flat, round faces that aren't considered classical beauty in China. But that's not my problem. At that point, liking her up and down, my only problem was how would I get this babe to come home with me.
Turned out it wasn't a problem.
"What are you interested in?" I asked. I hoped she was interested in me; wanted to read me. "These are horror novels. Do you like getting scared?" If she did, she could cuddle up to me to feel safe.
"Maybe. They have cool covers." She had a cool cover.
She picked up a copy of Salem's Lot. Stephen King. "Is this one good?"
"I haven't read it in years. I was thinking of re-reading it. It's about vampires."
She could be a vampire and suck the life out of me -- I wouldn't complain.
"Vampires?" Her flat, round, pretty face was blank. She didn't know what a vampire was, did she?
"Yeah," I said. "You know vampires?" I asked, watching her thin fingers on the book. I wanted them on me. Anywhere on me. "They drink blood."
"Oh." Her eyes lit up. They were thin and dark and hypnotic to me. "Maybe jiangshi? Yes, I know. I like. Scary."
"Jiangshi," I said. "Is that the Chinese word? You're Chinese, right?"
She nodded and smiled. "Yes, I am from China. And you said it perfectly. Jiang shi. Jiang shi is not quite the same as your vampire here," and she pointed to the book. "They eat qi, not blood."
"Qi. Hey that's coo. She nodded. "Jiangshi," I repeated. "You know, I've always wanted to learn Chinese. But I heard it was too hard."
"It will be easy for you," she said. "I think you're speaking is already hen hao."
"Hen hao," I repeated.
"See? That means very good." Dongyu giggled. "You said very good very good!"
"Well, then I definitely want to learn," I said. "How hard can it be?"
Dongyu turned the book over, then flipped the pages. "Not as hard as reading this book. I think you will have to help me."
"I will if you'll help me learn Chinese," I said. I looked right into her eyes. She looked down at the book and smiled.
"Okay."
"Okay? Deal?"
"Yes." She looked at me then. "Deal."
"Shake on it?"
She narrowed her already narrow eyes. "Shake? Like this?"
She shook her body lightly.
I laughed and she laughed, too. Good sense of humour. Absurd, maybe. Unexpected, for sure. I liked it. A lot.
I held out my hand. "Shake on it. It's a deal."
She put her slim hand in mine and already I didn't want to let it go.
2.
We had coffee nearby and I read her the first page of the book. Dongyu said she "loved" my speaking voice. Well, the feeling was mutual. I asked her to read some in Chinese and she said this book might be too hard.
"Just try," I said. "I can explain any words you don't understand."
I had a feeling that, being a student at the university, her English was totally fine but I suppose there's a difference between Salem's Lot and a nursing degree. Nursing. Imagining Dongyu in a nurse's uniform made me hard almost instantly.
And when she read to me in Mandarin, I nearly melted into the chair. My brain turned to slush. There was--is--something about her that goes beyond anything I ever knew before.
Chen Dongyu. Winter Rain. It was just about the most romantic name you could ask for. And being the old-young romantic I am, I fell for it, for her, hard. And looking at her as she sipped on a latte, I was hard. Very hard.
After coffee we had a stroll through the mall. We passed the cinema and I asked her if she wanted to watch a film with me. I was getting a date out of her already.
"Okay," she said. "But you choose."
I chose a romantic comedy--and actually I don't mind them anyway, unlike most guys--and she didn't get it, which I expected, but we shared popcorn and when I put my hand on hers in the dark, she didn't move it away. I just let it rest lightly.
You know how you can instinctively tell that someone is looking at you? I turned to her and found I wasn't wrong. I smiled in the flickering light and she returned it, moved closer and rested her head on my shoulder. I couldn't focus on the movie. The feeling of this Chinese dream-girl on me was too much. I decided right then not only that I would learn Chinese to speak to her in her language, I'd keep her as well. I wasn't letting this one go.
No way.
3.
We held hands on the way out of the cinema. It was magical.
"Hungry?" I asked as we walked out of the mall onto the streets.
"Wo e si le." She said. I'm starving to death.
"Wo e si le," I repeated and she squeezed my hand.
'Wo e si le." She put an emphasis on the "e" and I knew instinctively that I had to hit it. Like I had to hit her. That was all going to come, in good time.
I said it again and she nodded. 'Hen hao! Ni xihuan mian tiao, ma?"
"Um...yes," I said. "I'll have what you're having."
"Good." She pointed to a noodle restaurant across the road. "Zhege jiacanguan de cai hen hao chi!"
We ate and she pointed to items on the table and around the room, and told me the Chinese names for them. I repeated them, enraptured. She corrected me if I got them wrong and smiled the most beautiful smile when I got them right. "Tai bang le!" she said. "Amazing!"
And she was. She told me the dish names we wanted in Chinese and I attempted to order them when the fuwuyaun came. She giggled as I butchered it and I laughed, too. I never felt embarrassed when I was with Dongyu. The fuwuyaun looked at her and she ordered in proper Chinese. "That was pretty good," she said. "Zhende bu cuo." Really not bad. Just like Chen Dongyu herself.
Outside, the air had cooled. "Hao leng," she said. It's cold.
I dropped my backpack to the ground. "I have a sweater in my bag."