Ming’s Famous House

Sam Goldsmith

1’s fascination with the sign would have made him late, if A hadn’t found him under it. He stood before his destination, slack-jawed, staring up. The sign displayed maroon lettering of two scripts, the Roman alphabet and Chinese characters — that much he knew — but, while he should have been able to read the English, today those letters were as incomprehensible to him as the Chinese. Bouts of confundity such as this had become common since 1’s return home. He first experienced it when his feet took him off the airplane and led him into a cacophony of scribble, a bazaar of signs hawking directions he couldn’t understand. 

The sign had a comfortable familiarity. That is, the well of 1’s mind knew the information the sign was meant to convey, without having to rely upon the particulars of its language. 1 felt himself lost in the syntax, but, somehow, none of the meaning had escaped him. He was confused despite having understood.   

As was often the case with regards to signs since his return, it was its background rather than its confusing symbology that piqued 1’s interest. Backlit, iridescent, too warm to evoke a ghost yet too cold to seem alive. A gray scuff painted a possibility of story across the lower right corner. Perhaps the blemish occurred when the sign was mishandled during unloading, leading to an acrimonious but ultimately quick legal dispute between the owners and the workers, after which it was decided that removing the mark was not worth the effort. Or the owner may have scuffed the sign intentionally, dragging the heel of their boot across it before installation, out of a personal distaste for anything that looked too clean. Maybe, rather than having been placed there, it simply appeared one day, where it stayed unnoticed or remarked upon before 1 fixed it with his attention. 

The door beneath the sign swung towards him, and out walked A, interrupting 1’s meditation.  

“Oh, 1, you’re here.” She grinned, twirled a cigarette in one hand, withdrew the box with the other. “I thought I’d grab a smoke until the man of the hour got here. No need now. Great timing.” She pushed open the cigarette case with a thumb and restocked.  

A and 1 hugged. 1 could feel the sharp corners of A’s shoulder blades press against the meat of his forearms. She felt frailer than before, when she used to hug back like the trunk of a tree.  

“We can wait a minute if you want,” said 1, “if you would like a modicum of space from B.” 

A rolled her eyes. “Always. But, no, let’s just go in. We ordered egg rolls and I’m starving.”  

Around A’s wrist shuddered a polished wood bracelet, split between shades of deep soil and red clay. 1 expected her to take his arm as she usually did, but instead she pulled the door out. Her eyes held his with a timid hunger, like a vulture unsure if the corpse was actually dead. 1 dipped his head and stepped inside. 

“You look healthy,” A commented, coming up beside 1. “If I didn’t already know, I’d never guess what you’ve been going through.” 

“That’s true of most everyone, I’d say. Where are the others?” 

“Follow me.” This time she did touch 1’s arm, but only for a breath’s moment, before letting her hand dangle like a leaf at her side. 

The interior opened its familiar arms to him. Thin red carpeting rowed with blue dots. Small porcelain teacups, cream-colored plastic chopsticks, soy sauce bottles, lazy susans. A station against one of the walls with ribbed pitchers of ice water and two industrial-sized rice cookers. The scent of spices and oil reminded 1 of his own hunger, in a pleasant way, like a vacation photograph. To the best of 1’s recollection, none of the words on the sign outside had warned that a restaurant could be found inside. A sandwich board near the entrance, where, he recalled, the restaurant used to announce its weekly specials, now featured an artfully busy arrangement of hieroglyphics.  

“There he is! Welcome back!” B rose to his feet and enveloped 1. B’s head scraped the underside of the paper lantern that floated above the table. He hunched forward to accomplish the hug, barely a gentle squeeze. He didn’t supplement with his customary slap on the back. Though the slaps were painful, 1 missed the discomfort of them.  

B held 1’s shoulders and appraised him, like a wobbly bookshelf. “You look great.”  

“At best I look passable,” 1 corrected him good-naturedly. B’s smile pinched.  

He stepped back to admit C, who emerged from behind B’s boulder of a frame and embraced 1. “It’s good to see you,” she said.  

“Likewise,” said 1. “It’s good to be seen. Thanks again for the connection up north.”  

“Of course.” C allowed genuine concern to shape her face. “Did they give you any sense about what you can do?” 

“Come on, C,” B bellowed, edging forward into his seat and bullying C back to hers. “Today’s a party! Let’s kill the mood later.”  

“I want to know, too,”A muttered into her pint glass. She sat before a plain white dish painted with streaks of sweet and sour sauce and shards of egg roll. She held half of a roll between three fingers, her elbow on the table. 

“Okay, look, A, I know you were worried, but come on. The crew’s back together now. You can get serious and mopey whenever you want, but today’s a special occasion.” 

“You’re right, you’re right.” She straightened her back and produced a smile. “I’ll stop being a downer, even though I really am wondering about the serious stuff.” 

“Good girl!” B laughed, knowing how thoroughly A hated the phrase. She pointed at him with her tongue.  

1 deposited himself into the chair beside A, across from B fiddling with his Tsing Tao. C lifted a can of Diet Coke, placed her lips around the straw.  

“You already ordered tea,” 1 noted with delight. He reached for the scratch-surfaced silver pot. The body radiated a warning into 1’s knuckles that made life seem beautiful.  

“See, B? I told you he’d want it,” said A.   

“Okay, okay, you were right. Let’s toast!” 

He raised his Tsing Tao to meet the others’ aluminum, glass, and porcelain receptacles above the bed of egg rolls in the center of the table.  

“First, to D getting tenure!” 

1 all but threw his teacup to the table, eyes snapping to A. “Is that so? Finally?” 

“Finally’s an understatement.” A rolled her eyes into her glass and took a sip.  

“Congrats to you both!” B applauded.   

“Thanks,” A said. She set down her glass as she might a briefcase on a weekday evening. “You know, she’s been working on that book longer than we’ve been married. Isn’t that wild?” 

“I thought she published it before she filed,” 1 said.  

“She’s back at it. She doesn’t seem to care that it’s already out. I don’t think she can let herself be done with it. It’s her life’s work.”  

B cleared his throat. “Even if life keeps going, an accomplishment’s an accomplishment. I bet D’s on cloud nine right now, as she should be!” 

“Sure.” 

C’s lips found the straw to her Diet Coke again. 

“Now that that’s out of the way,” B went on, punctuated with the crinkling shell of an egg roll, “1, tell us about your travels. What was the great north like?” 

“He wasn’t on vacation, B.” 

“Well, excuse me for my interest in Canada. So? What was the most interesting thing you saw while you were up there?” 

1 spoke up. “I’d have to say, it was this nameless mountain town. I don’t believe I could ever forget it. It was like, well, something out of a magazine you read in a dream.”  

C’s head and eyebrows shifted.  

“There are still places without names?” A asked. 

“Nothing has a name until someone says one.”  

“What does that even mean, 1?” 

“This town hasn’t been called a name at all, by anyone, possibly ever. So, I could just say some name for it here, and none of you would know any better. But that seems a little disrespectful.”  

A shook her head and touched her fingers to her cheek, smiling despite herself. “Okay, weirdo, just tell us about this town.”  

B cleared his throat again. “Yes! What made it so dreamlike?” 

C gave a stiff nod. Her bracelet, also wooden, a counterpart to A’s, clinked against the plastic table covering.  

“For one, it was breathtakingly beautiful. Also, the high elevation literally took my breath away. Or, now that literally and figuratively mean the same thing, that distinction doesn’t seem to matter anymore.”  

A groaned and grinned. “1…” 

“I mean to say, the place can be found in the heart of the Canadian Rockies, where C’s connection suggested I look for a certain rare medicinal herb. Or, saying the town can be found is a bit misleading. In actuality, it’s next to impossible to just happen upon. As C’s connection described it to me, one can reach it only via a train that can’t be boarded except by those who already know about it.”  

B burst into laughter. “Like in Harry Potter? Platform nine and three-quarters?” 

“No, nothing remotely magical. I only mean to say, none of the trains a typical traveller might catch passes through the nameless town. I was told the town’s isolation is protected as a national treasure. Very few know of its existence. Even with directions from C’s connection, it was far from a straightforward journey.”   

C gave a slow nod, eyebrows pressing down.  

“You see, the train is totally unlabeled. No board indicating the final destination — makes sense, given that there is no name to display. No decal to brand the train. No schedule posted anywhere. No signs at all. On some days, the train camps in Vancouver Station noon to night, while on others it doesn’t make even a single appearance. Even if you find it, you might not be able to get a ticket, because it’s not clear which ticket you’re meant to buy. As it turns out, tickets may be purchased only onboard once the train is already in motion, cash only. A nerve-wracking experience, but I suppose I was more desperate than most. I spent two full days in the station waiting to board this mysterious train, only to learn upon departure that three other commutes had passed as I looked on without realizing.”  

B leaned forward, elbows on the table, chin in his palms. “Fascinating,” he murmured.  

“Pretty weird way to run a rail service,” A put in.   

A song began to clang through A’s phone, upside-down in its sage green case, rattling against the table covering. She snarled, apologized, and kept her conversation brief, uttering more monosyllables than words until she recited I love you to end the call.  

“D’s celebrating with colleagues,” A reported.  

“Don’t feel like you have to stay with us. Go meet her if you want.” C looked directly into A’s face and placed a hand on top of hers, which still gripped the phone.  

“Yeah, don’t let us keep you from your beau,” echoed B.  

“I’m good.” A saw 1’s eyes, returned the warmth of their gaze. She opened her mouth, then winced and looked back down at her mostly empty pint glass. “I don’t fit in with those academic types. They don’t care about anything I think the minute they learn what I do.” 

B’s mouth made a show of agapeness. “Seriously? You’re like the smartest person I know. So what if you decided to follow your dream?” 

C gave a pair of emphatic nods.  

A glanced up with a smile. “This is why I’d rather be here,” she said. “That, and 1’s been gone so long. It’s good to have the whole group together again.” 

“Hear hear!” 

The quartet toasted above the plate where the egg rolls had once been, now just crumbs and shredded lettuce. B beckoned over the waiter, who knew B well enough to put a hand on his back as he put in the group’s regular order. 

“Well?” B turned back to 1. “Enough about the train. What was it like when you got there?” 

“A little disorienting at first, and not just because of the elevation. The station is inside the mountain. It is a picture of simplicity, nothing more than a slab with some old lampposts lighting the way to the single-door exit. Very orange-brown. There must have been ventilation and a heat source, but I couldn’t see them. I left the station onto a chilly path lined with doors which, like the threshold to the train station, were embedded directly into the mountainside. The edifices were quite beautiful, with simple pinewood doors and smooth iron handles and hinges. Yet, I couldn’t figure out where any of them went. For all I could tell, a door might’ve led just as easily to a single-family home as it could a hospital, say. I was even more lost because of the total lack of signage anywhere.”  

B scratched at his neck. “Again with the no signs?” 

1 frowned. “Signs are a bit rude, if you consider it. They constitute just about the loudest form of visual communication commonly used. What if we installed little air raid sirens to blare constantly, at every bar, pharmacy, street corner, what have you? Sometimes one’s eyes might wish for a rest from all the attention-seeking, I’d guess.”  

“Not all signs are advertisements, though,” A pointed out. “What about road signs? Or that one there?” A gestured to the wall by the front door, where a framed standard-sized paper had been posted. “They put up health inspection forms for our safety.”  

C scrunched her face. “I’m not sure that counts as a sign.”  

“The nameless town did display inspection reports in their restaurants,” 1 confirmed. “But no street signs.”  

“How do people know where they’re going?” 

“I bet it’s a pretty small village.”  

“Not so. But what does it matter, when you get down to it? Of the countless street signs around us, how many did you use to navigate here tonight? How often do you rely on street signs to find your way in this full-blown city?” 

“All the time,” grumbled A. “I have to stop at so many goddamn stop signs.” 

“If everyone drove carefully and checked their surroundings at each intersection, we wouldn’t need stop signs either.”  

“How do people get somewhere they’ve never been before?” 

“You have to ask. Ordinary people are often remarkably eager to help each other.”  

“Fascinating.”  

“Although, you don’t really need help to get somewhere you’ve never been. Getting lost is just a matter of letting yourself move far enough without paying attention.”  

“1, oh my god, stop. You know that’s not what B was talking about. Specific places, not just somewhere new.” 

“It comes down to asking. You have to ask for directions. If you don’t, as was my mistake, you quickly lose yourself among the lookalike pinewood doors — and, remember, the door to the train station is one of them. The doors aren’t identical, but they aren’t distinct enough for a newcomer to find meaning in their subtle differences.  

“Not knowing what else to do, I wandered the main street and the network of paths that spidered out from it. But this was another mistake. Many of the paths lead seemingly to nowhere, or suddenly end.”  

“What’s the point of that?” 

C removed her lips from the straw. “That reminds me of something I read about medieval European city planning,” she began.  

“Yeah,” B interrupted, “didn’t they make their roads super narrow, like a maze to keep out invaders?” 

“They’re worried about invaders in the Canadian Rockies?” 

“I believe it’s a lot to expect from a road, that it will always take a traveler to a destination.” 

“1. It’s a road. That’s what it was built for.”   

“The townsfolk told me that the roads were designed with an eye towards how people were to think of them, not how they would actually use them. They were planned to remind people that a road implies a destination, but does not guarantee it.”  

“I swear, 1, your philosophizing.” A pressed her palm into her forehead.  

“First thing’s first, a visitor has to figure out how to get where they would like to go. But finding someone to ask directions isn’t so simple. People are rarely out and about, given the chilly and volatile mountain conditions. As the temperature outside nosedived with the setting sun, the initially off-putting option of knocking on random doors got a lot more appealing. But then, I learned the hard way that many of the doors have nothing but rock on the other side.”  

“No way,” said A and B at the same time, A with distaste, B with longing.  

“What’s their problem with predictability?” A griped. “Some things should be just what they look like. Especially roads and doors.”  

“I’ll bet the locals may know where each door and road leads like it’s second nature.”  

“Exactly right,” 1 confirmed. “Or else they ask their neighbors. So, I knocked on doors until someone answered. That’s how I met Emi, who told me a lot of the background I’ve been sharing. Exceedingly kind woman, very grandmotherly, though she was decades younger. Brewed a thistle tea that opened me right up where I didn’t even know I was closed. She didn’t seem to have any misgivings about my foreignness or my barging into her cozy home.  

“But she didn’t know of the rare herb C’s connection had described. A medicinal, mildly hallucinogenic bud of a berry so astringent that, rumor has it, it will dry out the eater’s tongue for a week. The plant grows, I was told, only in the highest elevations of the Rockies. When prepared properly, its healing benefits can be enjoyed without the tedium of hallucination.”  

“Ah, too bad. Hallucination could’ve been the best part,” B smirked. A couldn’t hold back a sigh that burst from the back of her throat.    

“Emi told me how to find an apothecary who might’ve come across the plant. I was instructed to go to the pretty door. I said, I think all the doors here are pretty. I was being polite, but it was also my true opinion. Emi answered, What a charming thing to say, and confusing.  

“I understood what she meant when I made it to the pretty door. A handful of knots had been accented in the woodwork, slightly more than the next-most ornate door. I realized that Emi used the word pretty to describe the door’s modest embellishments in an objective sense, like distinguishing a thing by its color — whether or not it was comparatively pleasing, it was undoubtedly the pretty door. As I studied it, I decided it looked especially tree-like, while the others looked especially wood-like. I thought of you, A. You’d have appreciated the woodwork.”  

A blinked her eyes into focus. “Me? Oh, I haven’t spent much time in the shed these days.” She wiggled her head. “I guess I miss it, now that I think of it. Just, how many cutting boards does a woman need?” 

“I keep telling you, let’s get a booth at Saturday Market. Make some more bracelets, too, and you’ll be a hit.”  

“Bracelets are super hard. And I don’t like Saturday Market even as a customer.” 

“That’s where I’d come in. You wouldn’t have to do a thing.”  

“So, 1,” A brushed B off, “did the apothecary hook you up with that rare herb?” 

1’s gaze drifted into another time. 1 did not describe the expression with which the apothecary greeted him at the pretty door. He did not describe how she prodded his arms and neck as if feeling for contraband, or how she clicked her tongue when she found it. He did not convey her total certainty in what she believed she had identified within him. He did not describe the depths of the wrinkle-shadows candlelight cast against her face. He said nothing of the tone of voice she used to say sorry without apologizing — none of this was her fault, after all. He did not tell of how, after he left the warmth of the apothecary’s hovel, he traced the knots in the pretty door with two fingers as if he would never again touch wood. He did not say how he wandered the labyrinthian network of paths in the dark and bitter cold, at first attempting to name the lamplit doors he saw, then, failing that, losing himself to thought.  

“It’s extinct now. Climate change, I’m afraid. Weather in the mountains has been more volatile and less snowy than ever. It’s too much for a fragile plant.” 1 shrugged with practiced levity. “Too bad, really. I’m told it was strikingly beautiful.”   

“Oh,” A hummed. She placed a hand on 1’s forearm.  

“All that effort!” B exclaimed. 

“It was not a total loss. I was able to visit a gorgeous town very few people even know about. Plus, I met some very kind locals in the process. I truly have no right to complain.”  

From here the conversation shifted toward the subject of the dishes that the waiter had delivered at some point during 1’s tale, and they committed themselves more fully to the work of dining.   

After dinner, the camaraderie gathered outside the restaurant for goodbyes, their night jackets illuminated by the sharp white light of the scuffed, incomprehensible sign. 1 and A exchanged hugs with B and C, who peeled away to carpool to their homes.  

A slipped a stick of cigarette into the corner of her mouth. “I’m going to grab a smoke before heading home. Keep me company?” 

“I’d love to.”  

1 let his head fall behind him, watching the steady shine from the sign. When he returned it to its proper position on his shoulders, he saw that A had not made to light the cigarette, which sat on her lower lip like a glass of water whose base hung half-way off the table. She looked away when her eyes met 1’s.  

“You know what I want to ask, right? Before B stopped me.” 

1 grimaced. “B can be bombastic, but he just wants control, same as anyone. His insistence on ignorance is his way of caring.”  

“I don’t want to be kept in the dark.” There was a miserable bitterness in A’s voice. “What did you learn? The whole purpose of this trip.”  

1 sighed at the sign overhead.  

“I won’t live to see the end of the year,” he said at last.  

A’s eyelids plummeted. “They’re sure?”   

“Few things in life are as sure as this.”  

“There’s no other doctor?” 

“A, while I was away I saw an army of doctors, healers, apothecaries, acupuncturists, shamans, surgeons, clerics, and so on. This is simply my reality.”  

A touched her chest with her chin, letting the cigarette spill into her open hand. A pair of chest-heaves later, she raised her gaze to meet 1’s eyes, which looked on with patient anticipation. His hands held one another behind his back.  

A stepped forward, pulled 1’s shoulders, and grabbed his lips with hers. It was a hungry kiss, drinking at the life he had left, trying to suck sand back up an hourglass.  

They shared the shadow of the restaurant sign for a moment, neither moving. Then A pulled away, facing him with her hands still gripping his shoulders.  

“I’m sorry, but I’ve always loved you,” she complained. “You already knew that, didn’t you.”  

1 did. But he had felt the affection in it more acutely when it wasn’t explicit.