Free The Jade Peony by Wayson Choy

stepped back from Father, felt sweat on my head. The large tree across the road seemed to bend. It was very hot. Father looked at me, touched my forehead like he would baby Sekky.
    “All right,” Father said. “You stay here if you want.”
    I sat down on the porch. Time went by, a minute, an hour. Jung and Kiam walked up the stairs, looked at me, said nothing, and then stepped into the house. My mind seemed to go blank. A horn honked. It was Tom’s Taxi. Stepmother waved for me to come down the porch steps. I helped her carry some boxes into our house; they were belongings to be shipped back later to China when Wong Suk sent for them. Then everyone put on jackets because Father said the docks would be windy and chilly.
    “I’m too hot,” I said, and shrugged off the jacket First Brother Kiam attempted to put over me. No one insisted.
    We stepped out of the house and started towards the taxi. Stepmother got in first.
    “Come on,” she said to me. “Get in.”
    I did. My white taffeta dress made crinkling noises.
    Wong Suk came in beside me, clutching his two canes, while the taxi driver and Father put the suitcases in the trunk of the car. I felt the deep warmth of his cloak and moved away. Kiam climbed into the front; Jung sat giggling on First Brother’s lap. Then Father stepped in beside Wong Suk and I was put on Stepmother’s lap. As the taxi backed up to make a U-turn, I could see, on the porch landing, Poh-Poh with Sekky squirming in her arms; Grandmother looked at us without a word.
    The taxi went smoothly forward, down our street, down streets soon unfamiliar to me. In no time we were driving past the docks, past huge ships bobbing like monsters. Tall cranes lifted up crates and steel pipes hung dangling in the air, clanging against each other. The air tasted salty. Thousands of gulls rose into the sky and dove down into the waters to feed on floating debris.
    We all got out of the taxi, stepped onto the pier, and felt it move with the waves breaking beneath on the pilings. Here, I thought, the Sea Dragon lives. My tap-shoes were noiseless against the cry of the gulls and the clamour of the waters slapping against the dock. Stepmother and Father helped Wong Suk out of the taxi. Brothers Kiam and Jung took the pieces of luggage out of the trunk and led the way towards large wooden gates and a sign that said: ALL VISITORS STOP HERE: CUSTOMS .
    We were not allowed to go past the customs landing and departure gates. Everyone started to say goodbye. The dock felt unsteady under my feet; everything smelled like iodine and salt and the sky was bright with light. Father gave a man in a uniform some money to carry Wong Suk’s luggage past the gates. I could only look about me, robbed of speech, spellbound. I remember Father lifting me up a little to kiss Wong Suk on his cheek; he seemed unable to kiss me back. His cheek, I remember, had the look of wrinkled documents. He looked secretive, like Poh-Poh, saying nothing. I felt his hand rest a moment on my curls, then a crowd of people began to push by us.
    “Hurry,” Father said, gently lifting the old man’s hand from my head.
    Wong Suk shook his shoulders so that his cape opened up; he shifted on his two bamboo canes, push-pulled, push-pulled away from us, but against the noise of the docks and the chaotic loading of baggage on huge carts, I could not hear the familiar tapping of his two canes. People stepped aside, made room for him; they openly stared, pointed, shook their heads. Wong Suk never looked at them, and he never looked back. The hump of his back animated his cloak. The sea-salt wind lifted up its mended edges. Fighting the wind, Wong Suk’s cloak began to flow away from him. The cape continued to move, as if in slow motion, to unfurl. Farewell, chak neuih, I thought it said, Farewell, my bandit-princess. I waved frantically back.
    Father lifted me up. Higher and higher.
    It was not a dream.
    Higher and higher, Father lifted me.
    The ship blasted