Side Story 1 HOW MUCH I ENVY YOU (1/4)  

Martin’s not my boyfriend.

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After a simple discussion with several teachers in the small conference room, Daisy scurried over to me before I could return to my office. “Hey! Dr. Xiao, I finally found you! Gary’s crying a fit right now! Hurry and check up on him. We can’t handle it!”

I immediately followed after her to the consultation room. I asked, “What’s wrong with Gary?”

“He hasn’t gotten used to it.” Daisy gestured at her right arm. “He keeps feeling that it hurts.”

I nodded and entered the room. The 7 year old Gary was currently crying in his mother’s arms, and my two female colleagues were standing at the side, helpless in the face of this crisis.

After Gary saw me, he seemed to grow more aggrieved. He cried out loudly, his face a puddle of tears.

“Leave it to me,” I told Daisy. I walked over to his side and sat down. With a smile, I said, “Who’s this crying so much? Could it be our little Superman, Gary?”

Gary was a pretty little boy with brown, curly hair and big green eyes. He looked at me, blinking, with beads of tears on his long eyelashes. Sniffling, he said, “Jodie, you lied to me! This arm isn’t good to use at all! It hurts so much!”

A year ago, Gary lost his right arm in a car accident. When his parents brought him in to get fitted for a prosthetic, he was extremely dejected. But for some reason, the little kid and I got along quite well. When the staff was measuring the size of his stump, he was very uncooperative. I went over to see what was happening after he started crying. After getting caught up on the situation, I tried to talk to Gary a bit. Only then was he willing to take off his clothes so we could get a mold for his stump.

“You can call me Jodie,” I told Gary at that time. “Lovely Gary, only the bravest kids get the chance to put on this super cool arm. I don’t agree to help everyone who comes asking for one. For example, people who love to cry. Oh… I really don’t like them.”

Gary was crying like a kitten. “Jodie, will I really be able to have a new arm?”

“Of course,” I told him with a smile.

After arriving in America, I studied biomedical engineering. After my PhD, my specialty was focused on intelligent prosthetics. Although most patients who come in, like Little Gary, will choose myoelectric prosthetics that respond to EMG activity (Note: electrical activity from skeletal muscles), I and my advisor and research associates are striving to tackle intelligent prosthetics that respond to human brain and nerve signals.

On Gary’s right shoulder, there remained a 10cm length stump. He was young and hadn’t adapted to the use of prosthetics. It was probably an emotional rejection. He periodically came to our institute for rehabilitation and training. He learned to use the prosthetic to drink water, to turn pages of a book, to eat, to pick up and place objects… I knew that this type of prosthetic wouldn’t allow him to perform very precise movements. For example, he wouldn’t be able to fold a (paper) lucky star, and he would be unable to use this fake arm to write. But I still patiently advised him.

“Can you pick up the cup for me, Gary?”

I encouraged him and watched him. Gary really tried to lift the cup of water for me. He was still in the adaptation phase for the prosthetic, so its appearance didn’t look like that of human skin. It looked like a metal skeleton, with lots of wires, connected to metallic fingers.

With ours and Gary’s efforts, this object that was completely lacking in vitality became a very magical part of his body. It wasn’t alive, and it wasn’t filled with things that were in human bodies, but it could move.

The arm could move. The elbow could move. The wrist could move. Even the fingers could move.

Gary’s arm trembled as he picked up the cup of water and handed it to me. I immediately accepted it and applauded him.

“You’re so awesome, Gary! You’ve made a lot of progress!” I gave him a hug and he raised his left arm to return the hug, his right arm moving slightly.

“Hey, don’t be shy,” I told him.

Gary’s face reddened and his brows furrowed as he exerted effort. He finally raised his right arm and completed his hug.

“You simply couldn’t be better!” I gently pat his head. “Gary, I know that in the beginning it’s a little hard, but trust me, it’ll get better with time. Maybe one day, you’ll play basketball like Kobe Bryant. He’s your role model, isn’t he?”

Gary nodded his head sheepishly. Then he said, “But Jodie, don’t you think this arm looks really ugly?”

I feigned surprise. “How could I? I think it’s really cool!”

“Next time I come, will you visit me again?”

“Sure, but you also have to listen to Daisy.” I pulled Daisy over and told Gary, “She’s a super amazing doctor, and she’ll teach you how to use your new arm. I’m definitely not as good as her with that.”

Gary finally agreed to let Daisy and the other staff members help him practice using his prosthetic arm. After I said goodbye with him, I heard some angry shouts from the rehabilitation hall.

At a place like this, people often lost control of their emotions. A healthy person suddenly losing one of their limbs because of an illness or an accident would naturally find it hard to accept at first. All of our staff understand that, but this man’s shouts were a bit excessive.

I couldn’t help walking over. I spotted him immediately among more than twenty rehab patients and the physiotherapist. He was a tall, young man, wearing a prosthetic left leg. He was leaning against the parallel bars as he shouted at the therapist.

I walked over to him and realized that although his hair and eyes were dark brown, his features were obviously East Asian.

He was still shouting when I attempted to calm him down. “Sir, please relax.”

He turned to look at me, his eyes showing surprise. Then he shouted again, “Who are you?! Mind your own business!”

I wore a light blue uniform and said, “My name is Xiao and I work here. I know that you’re going through a lot of difficulties, but sir, you’re a grown adult. There are many children here and they’ve gone through disastrous things as well, but aren’t they working hard to do well? Not only aren’t you setting a good example, you’re even scaring them.”

What I said wasn’t false. In the rehab hall, there were many kids wearing prosthetic legs, practicing to walk. A lot of the kids looked over at the man, a frightened expression on their faces.

His expression turned awkward and he clenched his jaw. After he stared at me awhile, he asked me in English, “Are you Chinese? Or Japanese, Korean?”

“Chinese,” I responded.

And then in standard Beijing dialect, he said, “If you were standing in my shoes, you wouldn’t say that.”

I decided to ignore him.

After I returned to my office, I made a cup of coffee. Wendy knocked on my door and said a package arrived for me from China.

Somewhat coincidentally, I walked over to the counter and opened the package. It was a book and a card.

“My Miss Crab,” I read the book name out loud. Then I saw the author, Mister Ostrich. A ‘boom’ went off in my mind as I started to feel a bit unsure about who and where I was.

I opened the card. It was Xie Yi’s handwriting.

Dear Jodie,

Merry Christmas!

Do you like the gift? We found him.

–Martin

Christmas 2010

I carried the book back to my office. As I passed by the rehab hall, the angry man from earlier was walking out. During the rehab session, he had been wearing gym shorts and his left leg was amputated. His thigh was connected to a stump-receiving chamber with a pylon underneath, like a leg bone. After the session finished, he changed into a black coat and jeans. If not for the crutch he was using, I probably wouldn’t have realized that he was missing a leg.

He’d already calmed down a great deal by then. He glanced over at me with a long face. I smiled and then walked back into my office.

When I was getting off work, Wendy and Daisy both called after me, “Dr. Xiao, it’s Christmas soon. Ada said we’d have dinner together tonight. You should come too!”

I put on my coat and shook my head. “Thanks, but I have an appointment tonight.”

Daisy giggled and said, “Are you going to video chat with your handsome boyfriend in Beijing?”

I couldn’t help laughing. “Martin’s not my boyfriend.”

“Please, he’s already come here several times to see you.”

“Regretfully, there’s just no chemistry between him and I.” I grabbed my bag and put on my scarf, and then walked out with them. After locking the door, I said, “Moreover, he already has a girlfriend.”

December in New York was as cold as in E City, if not colder.

I walked across the icy parking lot and drove my car home. The first thing I did when I got inside was pick up my cat.

I picked up (adopted?) this cat. It was yellow and white without an obvious breed. I named it Ah Miao, and since I gave it a Chinese name, I spoke to it in Chinese. This American Ah Miao answered really well, seemingly having grasped onto the language well.

I lived by myself at a building near the school. I’d bought the house because I planned to live there for a long time. The subject I was studying would need a lot of time, so I wouldn’t be able to roam around like my parents had. My dad was a zoologist and my mom was a veterinarian. The place they moved to was poor and remote, and they often ran into dangers. I used to want to live that kind of life, but the present me wanted to stay in one of the most developed countries in the world to further the studies of smart prosthetics.

I made myself a bowl of noodles and vegetable soup for dinner. Afterwards, I filled the tub with water and took a bath. Then I changed into my pajamas and crawled under the covers.

I read ‘My Miss Crab,’ and when I finished, I sat on my bed and sent Xie Yi an email on my laptop.

I told him I received the gift and thanked him.

His name immediately popped up on Skype and I answered his call.

“I just got to the office,” Xie Yi said clearly. “What are you doing?”

“I just got into bed,” I said. “Oh yeah, where’s he been all these years?”

He knew who I was talking about and quickly responded, “Sanya, in Hainan.”

“Oh…” It clicked for me. That was a place with a warm climate, and he hated cold winters.

“Crab’s going to see him in a few days,” Xie Yi said. “We’re planning on giving him a Christmas surprise.”

He’ll definitely be happy, I thought.

“Not bad.” I asked, “How have you been lately?”

“The same. You?”

“Also the same. Busy with work.”

“Will you come home next year for New Year’s?”

I thought for a moment. “Why do you ask?”

“Crab’s planning on bringing Gu Mingxi home then. If you came back too, we could have a big party.”

“I’m not sure,” I said. “We’ll talk about it when the time gets closer.”

Xie Yi suddenly said, “Jodie, you don’t have any questions you want to ask me?”

I rolled my eyes. “How are you and your girlfriend?”

“We broke up,” he responded very quickly.

I was left speechless.

Countless people had asked me before, ‘Jodie, why don’t you accept Martin?’ Or they’d say, ‘Xiao Yujing, why don’t you accept Xie Yi?’

The reason they ask that is because Xie Yi was really too perfect.

So perfect that you couldn’t find any flaws.

Once, I asked him, ‘Xie Yi, if you could use one animal to describe yourself, what would you choose?’

He said, ‘An eagle.’

In the story of ‘My Miss Crab,’ there were two supporting characters. Miss Antelope, who was myself, and the other was Mister Peacock.

I don’t know if that was Gu Mingxi teasing Xie Yi or not, but I felt that, regardless of whether it was an eagle or a peacock, they couldn’t be likened to Xie Yi.

He was a very, very good person. With an eye-catching appearance and a superior family background, but he didn’t carry the usual arrogant demeanor of rich kids. He studied hard and worked hard. If I had to name a flaw of his, it would probably be that other people see him as a bit whimsical, doing as he pleases.

Xie Yi never forced himself to do anything he didn’t want to. In that respect, he and I are very alike.

But where we differ is that he would always put his life on the line to do the things he wanted to do, whereas I would come to a decision to act or retreat after careful consideration.

That was the reason I rejected him.

He’s great, but I don’t love him.

Ah Miao jumped onto my bed and purred at my laptop. I sneezed and said, “Xie Yi, I’m going to sleep.”

I laid on the bed and Ah Miao settled down beside me. I was very tolerant with him, so if he wanted to sleep together on the bed, I didn’t shoo him away. (Note: The author doesn’t specify whether the cat is male or female. I simply adopted ‘he’ because using ‘it’ sounded strange in English.)

I pet Ah Miao, who appeared very comfortable, meowing lazily. Lying in the dark room, I couldn’t go to sleep. For some reason, I suddenly thought about that summer day so many years ago.

The first time I saw Gu Mingxi was the first day of school. There was a strange desk in the last row of the classroom. One side was a normal height, but the other half was shorter.

The rest of the class and I were all very curious, unsure of the purpose of that desk. Until Gu Mingxi came into the room.

That boy had a pair of doe eyes, pure and clear, calm. He didn’t seem to fear the class’ eyes on him. He just walked toward that particular desk and sat down.

There was already a girl sitting on the other side. Her hair was tied up in a ponytail and she had a smiling face. The boy walked over and wriggled his shoulders, and then his backpack fell onto his desk. Then he sat down and took of his shoes, resting his feet on his desk.

He lowered hie head, and naturally tidied up his backpack with his feet. His two shirt sleeves swung around by his sides. He would occasionally say a few things to the girl beside him. I watched for awhile before turning back to the front.

During the military training, I remembered his name.

Gu Mingxi.

Mister Ostrich.