It was spring in the thirty-fourth year of the Xinyuan Era.
Within the confines of the grand estate, maids and elderly servants hurriedly moved about, passing over pavilions and water gazebos, circling around the pond, their voices overlapping like falling petals, “The young miss has finished her lessons!”
A servant woman stood ready with a sweat towel, mouth rinse, and freshly brewed tea. Then, a ten-year-old girl, escorted by her lady’s companion, approached.
The girl wore a sky-blue, high-waisted ruqun[1] and adorned her twin buns with a pair of jade butterflies. Youthfulness still lingered between her brows, yet she was as endearing as the rain and snow. After washing her hands in the copper basin and drying them with the towel, she turned to a maid nearby and inquired, “Is it just tea today? What refreshments are prepared?”
“Replying to the young miss, there are water chestnut cakes and mandarin duck pastries. However, the Lady mentioned that the young miss has had a delicate stomach recently, and eating snacks might lead to indigestion and a sore tummy. She instructed us to put them away for now, but if the young miss really wants some, we can bring out a couple.”
“Mother is right; I’ll just have one, then. Sis Qin, what do you think, is the water chestnut cake or the mandarin duck pastry better?”
Little Xiang Wan was indecisive, her small fingers played with the hem of her dress as she looked back and forth at the golden lacquer tray.
Qin Xin smiled and said, “Doesn’t the young miss know what she wants to eat?”
Xiang Wan blinked, “Just tell me. If it’s not what I want to eat, I’ll surely show my displeasure, and then I’ll know right away.”
“The young miss always teases me. Once I make a choice, you’ll shake your head and say, ‘Silly girl, how can water chestnut cake go with Luan tea, and how can mandarin duck pastries be paired with Biluochun[2]?'”
Xiang Wan smiled with crescent eyes, “Oh my, am I such a miss?”
Qin Xin placed a mandarin duck pastry in Xiang Wan’s palm, knowing the young miss had been eyeing it several times, suggesting a favor for it.
Glancing down, Xiang Wan saw the lifelike mandarin duck, seemingly swimming within the lines of her palm.
It was the spring of 2001.
Ducks sliced through the water like scissors, their shadows scattered in fragments.
As village smoke curled upward, the road was littered with fresh cow dung and horse manure. Ten-year-old Chao Xin’s rain boots were a bit too large, causing a sloshing sound as she walked, her toes pushing against the tips. With a reed in hand, she strode along, swatting flies on either side.
It was a busy farming season, the school let out early in the village. Chao Xin entered her home, placed her schoolbag on the table, poured herself a glass of water, and drank with audible gulps. Then, she hurried off to the fields.
Her stomach growled as she walked, and she couldn’t help but glance at the fat pigs on the ridge, her mouth watering watching them.
Bent over tending to the crops, Chao Wang teased her, “Look at our second sister, drooling over the pig.”
Chao Xin shot Chao Wang a look before continuing weeding the rice paddy.
“Big sister,” she whispered softly as her rain boots sank into the paddy field, “I heard from a classmate today that she had beef jerky. If the beef is all dried up, can it be tasty?”
“It’s probably like cured meat,” Chao Wang replied, then added, “smoked and dried.”
“Oh, maybe it is,” Chao Xin said, looking down, smiling with pursed lips. “Sister, next time you go to town to sell vegetables, can you buy some beef jerky for me?”
“Ah? Wouldn’t we get a beating from mom and dad?” Chao Wang murmured quietly.
“I think that beef jerky might just cost fifty cents.” Chao Xin boldly speculated.
“Alright, if it’s fifty cents, I’ll buy you a whole pound,” Chao Wang said.
“Deal.” Chao Xin’s eyes sparkled, and she made a mental note. In the distance, an old ox mooed and swished its tail as it lumbered past.
It was summer in the fortieth year of the Xinyuan Era.
Cool breezes flowed through the corridors as the slender young lady on the couch turned over, placing her book on the ground and propping it up to stand. She played with it as if rowing a boat, the pages making a rustling sound.
On the table were fruits washed in well water, while a white mist rose from the palace’s ice basin. Qin Xin fanned the air with a small fan and asked Xiang Wan, “Is the young lady still unhappy?”
“I’m not unhappy, it’s just that they won’t let me play polo. In this scorching heat, if I go to the field, I’ll get terribly sunburned.” Xiang Wan, sixteen years old, rested her head on her arm, gazing dreamily at the birds outside.
How does that eagle soar so close to the sun without fear?
“You’re sixteen now, and it’s time for choosing a suitor. If you were to go out now and converse too much with some young master or noble son, there might be idle talk,” Qin Xin advised her.
“I understand.” Xiang Wan regardless watched the eagle, imagining the majestic figures on the field.
It was summer of 2007.
“Giddy up—!” The flying hooves shattered the dust on the road, stirring up a cloud-like trail of gray and white.
Chao Xin, now sixteen years old, lifted her slightly flushed cheeks as she held the reins horizontally, leaning forward to control the horse. Her recently grown figure moved gracefully with the horse’s motion, a fine sweat rolling from her forehead down her neck. Though the sun blazed overhead, it couldn’t match the brightness of the girl’s radiant, fiery smile.
This time she ranked in the top five of her class, and the teacher said she had a good chance of getting into university.
University, what is it like? She galloped her horse through the winding mountain roads. Standing by the roadside halfway up the hill, she watched over the crisscrossing paths, the houses with green tiles and earthen walls, and the villagers who had spent a lifetime bent over, their faces toward the soil and backs to the sky.
“I’m going to university,” she said with narrowed eyes, speaking in standard Mandarin, even her tear mole showed pride in her triumphant expression.
It was autumn in the forty-first year of the Xinyuan Era.
The delicately maintained courtyard was free of even a single fallen leaf, the diligent sweeping in the gorgeous house kept even the desolate autumn winds at bay. Sitting under the full moon of the Mid-Autumn Festival, seventeen-year-old Xiang Wan gently pushed herself on the swing, her feet lightly touching the ground.
“Miss, the palace gates are about to be locked, and the Prime Minister has not yet returned. It seems your marriage has been settled,” Qin Xin said as she swatted away mosquitoes before setting up pastries on the stone table in the courtyard.
“You seem pleased,” Xiang Wan remarked with a twitch of her eyebrow, her gaze resting calmly on Qin Xin.
“Having spent my days with you, eating and sleeping in the same place, I always wonder what kind of gentleman you’ll marry,” Qin Xin said with a smile. “There’s talk in the town that our Prime Minister’s daughter is so treasured, she might very well be destined for the palace.”
“Don’t speak nonsense,” Xiang Wan shook her head, cutting Qin Xin off.
Looking up at the solitary moon, she couldn’t fathom why, but a sense of unresolved foreboding loomed over her, as vast as the sky itself.
It was autumn of 2008.
“The Sun family?” The Sun family next door?
Seventeen-year-old Chao Xin returned from school to hear her family discussing arranging Chao Wang’s marriage. Chao Wang, slender as a sprout, leaned against the door, listening to the matchmaker from their hometown prattle on to her parents about the Sun family’s new building.
Then she ran out, flushed with embarrassment and panic, crouching beside the yard, hugging the old yellow dog in silence.
Chao Xin said, kicking at the stones beside her, her eyes welling up with tears.
“Do you really find it so hard to let go of me?” Chao Wang teased, hugging the dog’s neck, “You can still come and visit me. Besides, now you’ll have two homes. I just heard their house is huge, a building with floors. What if I ask him to keep a room just for you? Do you think he would agree?”
Holding onto a faint and distant hope for an unknown marriage, she spoke in a low and shy voice.
Chao Xin kicked a stone into the pitch-black pond, where it vanished as if swallowed whole.
It was the forty-second year of the Xinyuan Era.
Qin Xin, afflicted with tuberculosis, was rolled up in a mat and carried away. The pale-faced Xiang Wan, the betrothed Xiang Wan, steadied her own heart with a silk handkerchief, gazing listlessly at the young servant bustling about.
Afterwards, she returned to her room, lay down on the bed, and gazed at the embroidered canopy for a while before closing her eyes in exhaustion.
The sand in the hourglass ticked steadily, marking the countdown and also the overture to the unfolding drama.
Four hours.
Twenty-year-old Chao Xin was rushing between university and the recording studio, sitting on a bench at the school nibbling on a steamed bun.
Two hours.
At twenty-one, Chao Xin was a sensation, nodding off in the studio during a variety show recording.
One hour.
At twenty-five, Chao Xin, with Paipai sound asleep in her arms, struggled to fish the keys from her bag.
A quarter-hour.
At thirty, Chao Xin emerged from a parent-teacher meeting, giving Paipai a raised eyebrow and a comment that it wasn’t too bad.
Dawn broke, and moments in time coincided.
The year was 2023.
“Hello there, Du Ling.[3]“
Hello, Xiang Wan.
- Ruqun is a set of attire in Hanfu which consists of a short jacket typically called ru worn under a long Chinese skirt called qun.(Ruqun – Wikipedia) [return to text]
- Biluochun or Bi Luo Chun is a famous green tea originally grown in the Dongting mountain region near Lake Tai in Suzhou, Jiangsu, China. (Biluochun – Wikipedia) [return to text]
- Du Ling is the character Xiang Wan voice acted in the audio drama where she first met with Chao Xin, see chapter 2. [return to text]
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