Hi there:
First, a belated happy lunar new year to those who celebrate it. My thoughts also go out to any American readers who have had to endure the recent double whammy of pandemic and cold weather.
As promised, here’s the piece marking the anniversary of the Wuhan outbreak and lockdown. In this beautifully sensitive and empathetic essay first published by The Livings on Dec. 30, author Nanshanqiu delves deep into the impact of COVID infections on three Wuhan families, including her own.
Take care and see you soon.
—ML
One Year Later, the Stories of Three Wuhan Families
By Nanshanqiu
Edited by Xu Zhibo
Masked pedestrians stroll along Wuhan’s Jianghan Road on Oct. 6, 2020. Credit: Robert Way.
The weather was grim, the chill of early winter having quietly seeped into every corner. It was the first time I had passed Huanan Seafood Market since the outbreak.
My car sped by. Even though it was only a matter of seconds, my chest tightened. It felt as if I had passed the site of a major disaster. In the blink of an eye a year had passed. When I came across the name that had been squarely situated in the center of the storm, I couldn’t help going blank. It blew my mind that this exact day last year so many deaths were already in the making right here.
In this city, very few will broach the topic of that period in the early part of the year on their own initiative these days. It’s an emotional scar that has become a scab. Big or small, deep or superficial—no one will risk a casual touch.
Then how to bring up the subject?
“I’m shopping for a new fridge. What model are you using? Any recommendations?”
“Setting aside other features, size is the most important thing. It will make a big difference during an outbreak.”
I once asked my husband: “What’s the biggest personal change you have undergone because of the outbreak?” He paused briefly. When he spoke, he flashed a grin. “Have you noticed that I’ve started buying eggs in batches of 30?” I broke into laughter. At a time when our food supplies were depleted, eggs were indeed a lifesaver. Those few shells lived the glory of their existence when they begat the bowl of steamed eggs that passed for dinner for a family of three.
We don’t mention that disaster anymore. We’re reluctant to look back. All the fear, grief and anger, the late-night wailing sessions—they’ve all faded gradually in the process of self-adjustment. That deep-seated fear of death beckoning at the door—it seems so far-fetched, so surreal when I think of it now. Sometimes I ask myself, “Did that really happen?”
Some say the human brain is extremely adaptable, that forgetfulness bestows in people an uncanny resilience. Yet the legacy of that disaster simmers surreptitiously deep in the hearts of those who were part of it. The feelings emerge unceremoniously at the most mundane moments—when you’re shopping for groceries, or a new fridge, for example—delivering the most vicious zap.
Li Fei
My good friend Li Fei and her husband He Kai started developing fevers on the night of Lunar New Year Eve, the second day of the lockdown.
It’s not that they didn’t have the chance to leave. He Kai is from out of town. Li Fei had long purchased train tickets to leave Wuhan on Jan. 22, planning to spend Lunar New Year with her in-laws. On the 20th, after officials announced that the disease was transmissible between humans, she and I spent nearly half an hour on the phone debating whether or not to stay.
In the end, they decided to stay. Li Fei returned her train tickets at 9 a.m. on the 22nd—25 hours before the lockdown was imposed and eight hours before her scheduled departure.
On the morning of Jan. 24, He Kai started coughing, followed by a low fever. His temperature dropped slightly that night, but Li Fei started developing a fever. She took her temperature—38.3 Celsius. She felt anxious, but she also thought the odds were in her favor. There was no way she was infected of all people. She wasn’t that unlucky. She dragged herself to the medicine cabinet and downed a few pills with effort, ordering her husband to do the same. Priding himself in his good health, He Kai was adamant about refusing medication for minor discomfort or ailments.
After a night’s sleep, Li Fei’s temperature was even higher and her muscles started to ache. After struggling to take her own temperature, the reading was 39.5 Celsius. Li Fei turned over to check on He Kai, who was sound asleep. His face was slightly flush. She felt his forehead. It was burning. Cough, fever, weak limbs, sore muscles, lack of appetite and diarrhea—she probably caught the disease, Li Fei thought to herself. She thought hard, tracing her footsteps to see when exactly she got infected, to no avail. Every single one of her seemingly everyday moves in the past 20-odd days could have delivered the virus into her body. The thinking gave her a headache, which prompted her to give up. What’s the point of thinking about it now?
After being briefed by her on a video call, I was as frantic as an ant crawling on a hotplate and urged her to go to the hospital ASAP. She shook her head and said in a resigned tone: “Where could I go? All the pharmacies are closed. The community hospital near our home is closed too. As for the big hospitals, you’ve seen what condition they’re in from videos in social media. They’re a last resort. I really don’t want to go. I’m thinking they’re probably a more dangerous place to be than home, no?”
After being on medication on and off for a few days, Li Fei’s and He Kai’s fevers persisted and their conditions worsened. They started experiencing shortness of breath. They became masked bed-ridden patients, one taking over the bedroom and the other staking out the living-room sofa. Most of the time they could only lie prone and were too tired to converse or console each other. Eventually, they were so weak they couldn’t manage a sip of water.
The apartment became dead silence. That kind of silence panicked Li Fei. When it came time to eat, the person in better shape got up and made a simple meal of noodles or congee, which was split into two bowls. Neither could eat much, but they kept their leftovers for the next meal—their food supplies were already quite depleted. Li Fei wondered if “they would die of sickness or hunger first.”
Eventually, He Kai was too tired to wait by the stove when he prepared a meal of noodles. After the water boiled and he cast the dry noodles in the wok, he’d crash on the sofa again until he felt strong enough to serve the noodles. More often than not the noodles were too soft and glued together. Neither He Kai nor Li Fei minded though, because they had both lost their sense of taste by then.
Li Fei would even puke the water she drank. The only thing she could stomach was oranges. They still had a sack at home, which were intended for snacking during the train ride to her husband’s hometown. Most of the time Li Fei could only use the sour taste of an orange to stimulate her taste buds.
On Day 5, a doctor I knew well asked me to tell Li Fei to seek medical attention. After persistent fevers that lasted so many days, self-recovery was out of the question. No matter how big of a challenge it posed and how terrified they were, she and her husband had to head to the hospital, otherwise their conditions would only get worse. I asked my friend in a desperate tone whether he could help secure preferential treatment at the hospital where he worked. He apologized profusely, saying that even the advance queue for relatives of hospital employees numbered around 100. Even the head of respiratory medicine couldn’t help his own relatives cut in line.
I called Li Fei in tears, urging her to head straight to the hospital. A long silence followed. Then she said in a calm voice: “You know what? Except for you and a few others, I don’t want to answer any calls. I don’t even have the energy to speak. Sometimes I think to myself, ‘Let it be.’ Maybe this is a calamity I have to face. If I can make it, great. If not, then forget about it. There’s nothing more to say or do.”
Cradling my phone, I knew full well that whatever I said rang hollow. The sense of good fortune I felt for having survived a catastrophe wasn’t a source of consolation. Instead, I felt shackled, weighed down by a heavy lead anchor that tugged me into the depths of water. Another long silence ensued. The only sound was my breathing and Li Fei’s coughs. After a while, a faint whisper finally emerged from the other end. Li Fei promised me to head to the hospital the next day.
***
First thing in the morning on Jan. 29, Li Fei mustered the courage to leave for the hospital. He Kai was initially reluctant. He felt his symptoms were on the decline and his temperature had dropped slightly. He didn’t want to take the risk. Li Fei pleaded: “Treat it as keeping my company. I’m scared of going to the hospital alone.” Only then did He Kai grudgingly agree.
The closest designated hospital for COVID patients was an hour by foot. Public transportation had been shut down and the couple didn’t own a car. Li Fei refused my offer to drive them there. Leaning on each other, Li Fei and He Kai stumbled their way through the journey. When they got tired they stepped aside for a break or plain sat on the ground. The already considerable trek ended up taking more than two hours.
The scene at the hospital resembled what they had seen in videos circulating on social media. The corridors were packed like sardines, with no end in sight. The young doctor issuing CT orders fought the urge to doze off by rubbing his eyes hard from time to time. After a seemingly interminable queue, Li Fei finally landed their numbers: 577 and 578.
She haltingly grabbed a passing nurse to ask: “What number are you on now?”
The nursed paused to think. “About 100-plus?”
Li Fei was stunned. “Then will you get to the 500s today?”
The nurse shook her head vigorously. “I don’t know, but it’s best you stick around. If you come tomorrow morning it’s the same setup. You have to take a new number.”
Taking in the scene of the entrance to the CT room awash with black hair and listening to the intermittent coughs of people collapsed on chairs or leaning against wall, He Kai lost it. In a muffled voice, he declared: “Forget about it. I want to go home.” He proceeded to drag Li Fei toward the entrance.
Li Fei summoned all her might to stop him. She asked her husband to wait by the hospital entrance while she lined up inside. She would call when their numbers were called. He Kai finally agreed after extensive lobbying.
Li Fei found her resolve and sat alone by the entrance to the CT room, dressed in a hat, shoe covers and two face masks. This was all the protection she could think of and manage. Initially, a mere cough from a neighbor would send her shivering, but eventually she zoned out. The emotions she expected to surface—fear, sadness and others—never materialized. Instead of her present circumstances, she devoted all her attention to her husband, who was waiting outside. It turned out to be a welcome escape.
Occasionally, she blamed He Kai for being timid and not sticking up for her and leaving her all alone among a sea of patients. (She actually forgot she was a patient herself.) In other moments, she worried whether the weather conditions outdoors would erase the progress He Kai had just made in recovery. In late January, Wuhan had just experienced 10-plus days of light drizzle, which made for a piercing, damp cold sensation.
When the clock was about to strike 10 p.m., Li Fei had waited alone for nearly 12 hours. The announcer had yet to hit the 300s. Li Fei was closed to giving up. When she got yet another angry call from He Kai urging her to head home, she got up without hesitation. She didn’t want to contemplate the day lost at the hospital nor her present conditions. Her only thought was that she couldn’t spend the whole night outside the CT room, let alone make her husband stand outside all night.
“Heading home now. Probably won’t come back tomorrow. I’m too tired. I can’t think. I just want to go home,” she told me by phone. Her tone was firm. There was no room for negotiation.
En route, He Kai’s anger lingered. “I hate Wuhan. I regret coming to this bloody place. Why did I move here? I didn’t have to go through this. If I survive, I’m definitely going to leave Wuhan and live healthily in my hometown.”
Li Fei responded with a silent glance. She was too tired to speak. The head swivel alone seemed to consumer 90 percent of her energy.
***
On Feb. 2, with help from friends, Li Fei and He Kai finally got their CTs. Three days later, community workers arranged for them to get nucleic acid tests.
On Feb. 7, Li Fei was diagnosed as a moderately ill patient and He Kai’s results came back negative. Li Fei detailed her husband’s symptoms to a community worker, wondering if he should get a second test in case the first one was a false positive. The worker responded with a chuckle: “A second test? Get in line then. Who knows when we’ll finish the first round of testing.”
Two days later in the afternoon, Li Fei became one of the first patients admitted to a makeshift hospital. Less than two weeks later, Li Fei was discharged and transferred to a halfway isolation facility converted from a factory dorm. On March 7, the day she completed her two-week quarantine, she cried for the first time since the outbreak, as she admired her surroundings on the way home, which were gorgeously bathed in gentle moonlight.
***
Little did Li Fei expect her predicament to extend beyond the winter.
In April, shortly after Wuhan ended its lockdown, Li Fei’s company opened for business again too, but she didn’t hear from her office after waiting for 10 full days. It seemed the worry nagging at the back of her mind came true. After pondering the matter extensively, Li Fei decided to call her boss.
The phone rang for a long time. Only when Li Fei was about to hang up did her boss pick up. He said in a calm tone: “Yes, I was about to get in touch. We’ve weighed the matter for a long time. We’ve decided you need some more rest, considering the fact you were just discharged from the hospital. So just rest up for another month. Don’t worry—we’ll wire you a subsidy periodically to cover your living expenses.” Li Fei was at a loss, but she also didn’t think she had grounds to object.
During the long wait of two months, apart from a monthly transfer of just under 2,000 yuan (US$310), Li Fei felt as if she had lost touch with every single one of her colleagues. Her WeChat work group got livelier and livelier. Everyone except for her had gone back to work.
He Kai suggested Li Fei get in touch with her office again to see about her next step. After considering the proposal, Li Fei refused. “If my boss genuinely wants me back, I would have been back a long time ago. What’s the point of donning thick skin and asking again?”
He Kai repeated his suggestion a few times, sparking several major arguments between the couple. Their relationship hit another low. With Li Fei stripped of her regular salary and He Kai’s income reduced, what was a modest lifestyle to begin with required further belt-tightening. On grocery runs He Ki stuck to mainly veggies. On the rare occasion he bought meat, he would divide the portion into several smaller ones before storing them in the freezer.
From He Kai’s perspective, it was par for the course for Li Fei to approach her company. “They still haven’t fired you, which means they are still weighing their options. We’re just asking where they’re at. What do we have to lose? To take an extremely defensive stance, maybe begging will nudge them in the direction of keeping you.” He Kai was baffled by Li Fei’s “unprecedented pride.” “We’re just ordinary civilians. What’s more important than earning a living and survival?”
Li Fei confided in me that this was perhaps the biggest crisis her marriage had faced. She wondered from time to time when she started feeling disappointed in He Kai. Was it the unfounded accusations when they fell sick, as if she had infected him? Or was it that winter evening when he hid outside the hospital, leaving her to line up alone? Or was it on the eve of her admission to the makeshift hospital, when she said in a vulnerable moment: “It would be great if you could go with me.” He Kai blurted: “You’re on your own. I’m not going to that bloody place with you.”
But the current dispute probably caused the most pain. He Kai couldn’t stop urging Li Fei to get in touch with her office. She often caught herself daydreaming when her husband blabbered away. Sometimes the following question would emerge: “Out of all people, is this the man I chose to spend the rest of my life with?”
I chose my words carefully as I tried to talk Li Fei down. “Maybe it’s just that He Kai is under too much pressure and wants you to help shoulder the load. You’ve been married for 10-plus years. You know his character well. Don’t repudiate him so casually. And whatever happened between you two, he went all out to take care of it when you were sick and after you were discharged. In the direst times, he cooked for you despite what horrible shape he was in. You’re a couple who’s been to hell and back.”
Li Fei interrupted me with sarcastic laughter. “You know what? I often wonder if we didn’t get sick together, if I were only one infected, whether he would stick behind to take care of me or bolt immediately. I’m really not sure.”
I was at a loss for words. Li Fei chuckled. “Forget about it. There’s no point in dwelling on it. There’s no way I would divorce him because of this, right? Let’s leave it at that.”
After another pause, she mumbled: “But I just can’t help thinking. Whenever I’m free, I keep wondering if something happens to be in the future, will he abandon me again?”
***
After a tortuous wait until June, Li Fei’s company finally got back in touch. First, it was a department manager, then a department head and finally a vice president in charge of her department. They all put forward the same line: “After a comprehensive review, the company has concluded that your skillset is a poor match for your current position and would like you to resign.”
Li Fei burst out in bitter laughter. “A mismatch? I’ve been fucking working this position for three, almost four years. Now you say I’m a bad fit?”
It was the first time that Li Fei had ever sworn at work. Everyone froze, perhaps because it was so out of character with her usual ladylike persona. The meeting arrived at a delicate juncture. After an extended silence, the vice president delivered the following spiel: “Li Fei, in fairness, the company has treated you well, no? Don’t you remember how we mobilized all our resources to secure you a hospital bed and medication when you got sick? Don’t you remember how Manager Hu personally delivered your medication to your apartment in heavy snow? Every single installment of your monthly stipend was wired on time in the past six months. Have you forgotten about that already? We’ve been colleagues for so many years. We also have a personal relationship with you. We went to bat for you when you were in a difficult spot. Now that the company is in a tough situation, can you empathize with us?”
Li Fei turned teary eyed. She took to heart everything that her colleagues did for her when she was at her most desperate a few months ago, but “how come it’s the same people who came to my rescue kicking me when I’m down?”
She fought hard to curb the tears that were about to erupt, responding in a trembling voice: “I haven’t forgotten about all the help you gave me. I can also empathize, really. I can understand why you are all terrified of me right now.”
She lifted her head to make eye contact with the other colleagues in the room. They all looked a bit embarrassed. Li Fei continued: “On the point of whether business is suffering, I’m not going to engage in a debate. I got the full lowdown before I left for this meeting. No one is being fired except for me.”
“I thought things over on the way here. If people are wary of my presence, there’s no point in my staying. I can leave. I just have one request. You’re aware of my current circumstances. Odds are my job search will take some time. The one thing I ask of you is that the company fires me instead of having him resign. That way at least I can collect unemployment payments while I’m looking for new work.”
This was probably the most aggressive tone Li Fei had taken at work all these years. She spoke her mind in one go. The room went silent again. Eventually, the HR manager interjected: “As you know, this is a rather delicate situation. If word gets out that we fired a COVID patient, it will affect our reputation. I hope you can empathize.”
When the HR manager finished, the mood in the room hit another low. Li Fei lowered her head. The others also stayed mum. When it seemed as if everyone was fed up with the stalemate, the vice president blew up. “It’s fine if you don’t want to resign, then please consider switching positions or location. We’ll let you know when we decide,” he fumed before storming out of the conference room.
Li Fei told me with great sadness that she was clear if her company were determined to do so, there were a countless number of ways to apply pressure so she would quit on her own, but she didn’t think the situation would come to that. “Having been colleagues for so many years, that’s worth something, right? Plus what did I do wrong?”
About two weeks later, Li Fei’s bosses made their final offer. The company would keep her on payroll for another two months, during which period they would continue to contribute to her social security payments. Li Fei didn’t have to go to work—but she had until the end of August to resign.
Li Fei’s line manager mumbled to Li Fei that the offer was a result of intense lobbying of the vice president by himself and their department head. What the vice president had in mind was to transfer Li Fei to a branch office in the southern suburbs of Wuhan on special assignment. In his own words: “A one-way commute alone would take two hours and the monthly salary would be 4,500 yuan. She’s bound to quit on her own in less than a month.” Word has it the VP fumed during the discussion: “She’s forgotten about all the help we gave her when she was sick completely. We don’t need an ingrate like her!”
I asked Li Fei if she was going to take the deal. She said: “I don’t think I have a choice. If I were actually assigned to the suburbs, I just might quit on my own. Forget it—let’s call it a day. The two months of salary amounts to a pretty long period of unemployment payments, no?” The optimism in her voice strained credibility. “Think about it this way—I get to rest at home for two months with pay. That’s not bad.”
The feigned positivity didn’t last much longer. “What am I going to do going forward? Considering the current state of the Wuhan job market and my awkward age and my prior illness, I probably won’t be able to find any work. Should I mention my infection during interviews? If I do, no one will hire me. If I don’t, I won’t be able to live with myself. I really don’t know what to do. I don’t want to think about it. Whenever I do, I feel extremely hopeless.”
To survive a major disaster seems to connote good fortune and a bright future, but very few people ponder the fact how people who were beaten senseless by tragedy move on with their lives.
***
After recovering from COVID, Li Fei gave blood.
She frequently reminisces about her time in the makeshift hospital. Even though she couldn’t sleep well, going to the bathroom was painful and there were always patients bickering and arguing over all sorts of trivial matters, despite the crying, cursing and quarreling, she finds herself reflexively thinking back to the same cast of characters whenever she needs inspiration.
There was the older man the next bed over. His parents died of COVID back-to-back in late January and early February. He was also a severe case. He had lost track of how much time he spent in the hospital. He was transferred to the makeshift hospital only after his symptoms receded. Initially, big brother was reticent, tearing up whenever he opened his mouth. Before he was finally discharged, he bowed properly twice before the doctors and nurses at the hospital.
The young woman two beds over was in early 20s. She and both her parents were infected. Her dad was in serious condition at a proper hospital while her mother was being treated at another makeshift facility. She frequently called her dad in tears, but could never get through. Any mention of her dad would open the floodgates. Li Fei and other patients could only urge her to calm down and look on the bright side.
The young woman had three nucleic acid tests and two CTs at the makeshift hospital. With each CT, her condition deteriorated. Soon she was transferred. Li Fei thought of her often. She wants to know what happened to her, whether her parents eventually returned home, but they never had the chance to exchange contact information during their fleeting encounter.
After the young woman was transferred, she was replaced by a sassy auntie in her 50s who spoke in a loud, high-pitched voice at rapid-fire speed. Aunties like her are called “missus” in the Wuhan dialect. Missus was extremely talkative, often chatting up Li Fei, asking her why she didn’t want kids. But what Missus loved the most was shooting the breeze with the nurses. She loved showing off pictures of her son to the two or three nurses assigned to her cheerfully while mentioning that she lived on Jianghan Road. “That’s a great location. It’s Wuhan’s most bustling area.” She never tired of inviting the nurses to her apartment after she recovered. “Better yet, you should marry into our family!” she would add.
So when her fellow patients encouraged her to give blood, she didn’t hesitate. She didn’t think much of it, but the thing is, soon after that another patient told her that a company was paying for blood from recovered patients. Li Fei was skeptical, her first instinct wondering if it was a scam. Lo and behold an Internet search came up with a short news story about a company setting aside 3 million yuan to reward recovered patients who donated their blood.
Fearing that it was indeed a scam, Li Fei thought long and hard before acting. She was worried that her personal information might be used for illegal purposes. Eventually she decided to give it try. In just over a month, she received 10,000 yuan.
She was a bit dumbfounded when she checked her balance on her ATM card, unsure how to react.
***
After Wuhan lifted its lockdown, my life became crazy busy. I never found time to meet up with Li Fei.
By middle age, I found myself letting the interval between get-togethers with friends grow to years. Stupid me took the longest time to recognize the importance of face-to-face meetings to Li Fei. In October, I had major surgery. In a video call, Li Fei asked tentatively: “I want to visit you. Is that OK? I’m not even sure myself if that’s an appropriate request.”
Her tiptoe approach was a major wake-up call, soon filling my entire being with intense self-blame. I responded instantly: “No visitors are allowed at the hospital, but once I’m discharged, let’s plan on afternoon tea ASAP!”
“It’s a date then,” she said with a gentle smile.
Jasmine
On Jasmine’s original agenda for 2020, there was only one mission—to make sure her daughter got into a top junior secondary school. In September 2019, her daughter started sixth grade as a stellar student. She was always a source of pride for Jasmine. Jasmine’s goal for her daughter was Wuhan’s best junior high—Wuhan Foreign Languages School.
Little did she expect 2020 to turn into a major black hole.
On Feb. 18, when Wuhan’s outbreak was gradually coming under control, Jasmine got a call from the nursing home where her mother was living saying that she had been infected.
Jasmine’s mother had just turned 74. She had a stroke two years ago. She was able to take care of herself after rehab but she couldn’t shop for groceries and cook, let alone attend to her husband, who was in her 80s. Jasmine has two kids attending primary school. Work and family commitments already have her running around like a headless chicken. Worried about leaving her infirm parents at home alone, she was forced to send them to a nursing home.
Jasmine’s mother was quite easygoing, but her father was very exacting when it came to nursing homes, rejecting multiple options. After another several rounds of asking around, Jasmine finally landed one that pleased her father. The elderly couple were assigned to the same room, so they could keep each other company all day. It wasn’t that different from living at home. Occasionally Mom and Dad would argue. Instead of complaining to her husband, Mom would secretly confide in her by phone and threaten to move out. “I don’t want to live with the old geezer anymore,” she’d say.
On Feb. 14, Mom started feeling unwell. Dad was feeding her her meals. Jasmine later told me that luckily Mom was cared for in her final days, after taking care of Dad all her life.
Jasmine took Mom to the hospital. Mom passed away in the early hours of Feb. 21. Mom was still active in the family WeChat group on the 19th. Those turned out to be her final words on WeChat. The next time Jasmine saw Mom was spring, when she picked up her ashes at the funeral home.
Mom was a bright, cheerful personality. Her happiest occasion was when Jasmine visited the nursing home with the kids. On those days Mom felt vain like a young girl. Jasmine said despite mustering all her imagination, she still couldn’t picture Mom, who was at her happiest in a crowd, passing away alone without a single relative by her side.
During the early stages of Mom’s hospitalization, Dad would call Jasmine several times a day for updates. Initially Jasmine wasn’t forthcoming, doling out information in dribs and drabs and using vague language. Dad didn’t press her for details either. Eventually when Jasmine broke down and told the truth, Dad’s response wasn’t as emotional as she had expected. Dad paused for several seconds before saying: “When I was badgering your mom with calls a few days ago, her phone was turned off.”
Then Dad fell into a silence. Clearly, he was mentally prepared.
Later on, whenever Jasmine felt sad about her Mom, Dad would console her by saying that Mom passing before him was a blessing in disguise. Dad said even though Mom took care of him his whole life, he always worried who would look after her if he died first. “Her health is mediocre and her pension payments are limited. If she died after I did, she would suffer a lot.”
The residents of the nursing home are all elderly. Deaths are very common. Whenever Jasmine visited her parents, she would always notice that certain residents she greeted last time were gone. When she confirmed their deaths, she couldn’t help getting emotional. By contrast, Dad was calm, commenting that dying in such circumstances wasn’t a bad thing. Dad was more enlightened about death than she was, Jasmine thought.
Jasmine had discussed with Dad a long time ago on the spur of the moment whether he wanted to be intubated when he was in critical condition. Dad responded with a peaceful no. But Jasmine had never had the same conversation with Mom. She didn’t know her thoughts on the matter.
On Feb. 19, after delivering doses of gamma globulin to Mom, Jasmine succumbed to an inextricable form of suffering. She kept wondering, “Is there more I can do?” Word had it at the time that the most effective treatment was using the plasma from recovered patients, so she went all out in search of plasma. Yet when her anxiety was at its peak, she got a call from the doctor saying that Mom’s condition was deteriorating so quickly it didn’t matter.
When Mom was critical, the doctor suggested not intubating, saying the odds were against her. But in between the lines he seemed to hint that if Jasmine insisted, they were willing to go the extra mile and risk exposure to COVID. Jasmine stayed silent. Years ago she had read an article on palliative care. She considered herself educated on this front, so she decided against intubation.
After Mom passed, Jasmine’s failure to get plasma and bypass intubation became a mental block, circling her like a hawk every day, torturing her, so much so that she didn’t want to go to bed—because every morning she had to tackle the self-blame all over again. Jasmine couldn’t help following and reading about successful cases of intubation. Yet every new case that meant delight for others translated into self-flagellation and suffering for her.
After Jasmine retrieved Mom’s belongings from the hospital, Dad tested positive. When she checked Dad into his hospital room, he threw a major temper tantrum, ostensibly because the room didn’t have a toilet bowl in the bathroom. After calming Dad down, Jasmine apologized to the nurses profusely. Jasmine knew Dad threw a fit simply because he was sad about Mom dying alone and didn’t know how to vent.
The nurses didn’t take it to heart, responding with a smile: “It’s OK. We don’t understand any of it anyway.” Only then did Jasmine realize that Dad’s section of the hospital was being run by a medical team from Jiangsu Province. The soft sound of the Suzhou dialect had put a significant damper on the prevailing anxiety of the ward.
As Jasmine got ready to leave, she was still worried about Dad’s bad temper. Luckily, Dad’s two “young” roommates—one was actually 58 and the other 70, “young fellas” by Dad’s standards—were quite affectionate. Jasmine could overhear them saying while on the phone with Dad: “Don’t worry. We’ll take good care of him for you.”
Jasmine was soon shipped off to a quarantine hotel, where she felt quite conflicted. On one hand, she pestered Dad with calls. On the other, she held regular video calls with her daughter to make sure she was studying. She refused to indulge herself a single idle moment. But at some point she would run out of tasks. When she was free, Jasmine practiced building pyramids with the large stock of cup noodles in her hotel room. She devoted all her energy to mastering how to construct the sturdiest pyramid.
When a pyramid finally collapsed, Jasmine would go blank for a while before pulling out her phone and scrolling through recent pictures of Mom, examining each one carefully, which brought a smile to her face. Many of the photos were food porn.
Jasmine would lift her head and mutter to herself: “Mom, you lived every day to the fullest. Make sure you have as much fun in your next life!”
***
In April, after Wuhan ended its lockdown, Jasmine picked up Mom’s ashes from the funeral home. She found herself stuck in a massive traffic jam. “With scenes like this, don’t talk to me about ‘victory.’ I can’t handle that term.”
Maybe it was because she wasn’t present for Mom’s passing, but for quite some time, Jasmine had trouble coming to terms with the fact. She often dreamed of Mom’s return. In these dreams, she’d be elated and relieved. After confirming details for some of Mom’s funeral arrangements, she gradually accepted the fact that Mom was gone, but she still dreamed of her. The difference was that now whenever Mom showed up, Jasmine was clear that it was a dream.
Two days before Mother’s Day, Jasmine dreamed of Mom again. Mom was standing in a dark corner and she had to approach to recognize her. At that moment, she was fully aware it was a dream. In the dream, she calmly told Mom to step forward to a brighter spot, so she could get a better view.
It only dawned on Jasmine on Mother’s Day that she didn’t have to brainstorm for a gift that year.
Because of the logistics involved, Jasmine didn’t return to her hometown for Mom’s memorial service and funeral until September. She picked Mom’s lunar calendar birthday for the occasion.
“Happy birthday, Mom,” Jasmine mumbled. “Next time, please stand in the brightest spot in my dreams.”
After the funeral, street vendors were hawking leftover lotus seed pods. Jasmine stopped. In past summers, she always remembered to buy fresh pods for visits to the nursing home. Mom always complained that while all sorts of fresh produce were in abundant supply at the nursing home, lotus seed pods were hard to come by. Jasmine would always buy a big batch for Mom. Mother and daughter would sit on the edge of Mom’s bed, chatting away while cracking the pods open.
Jasmine froze at one of the street stalls and stared at the lotus seed pods for the longest time. “Want some?” the vendor asked. Jasmine hesitated before shaking her head and walking away.
***
After Mom passed, Jasmine subscribed to the WeChat feeds of about a dozen relatives of COVID patients who died, but the survivors never got in touch with each other, simply following each other’s newsfeeds in silence. There is no such thing as perfect empathy. What Jasmine could find was a bit of resonance in people who shared a similar experience. Pain doesn’t necessarily manifest itself in hysterical howls. It might just bubble to the surface acutely in a dream.
Preparing for Mom’s memorial service and funeral also inevitably drew attention away from her daughter’s preparation for the secondary school entrance exam. Jasmine’s daughter ended up missing the cutoff for Wuhan Foreign Languages School by 2 points. After her Mom’s memorial service and funeral were completed and her daughter was enrolled in another secondary school, Jasmine switched jobs.
Less than two months later, in late November, Dad’s COVID-related symptoms flared up again. He spent three days in the ICU before being transferred to a regular ward. As of this writing, Jasmine’s dad has spent several weeks in the hospital, relying on an oxygen mask the entire time.
“Surreal,” Jasmine told me with a chuckle. “I used up all my bad luck in one year, no?”
Mom
Mom didn’t set foot outside her apartment from January to early June.
On Jan. 15, Mom even had a pre-Lunar New Year meal with old classmates. They went singing afterward. This has been their routine since forever. A few days later, one of the classmates said in their WeChat group that she fell sick and had to be hospitalized. She urged everyone to take care.
A few days after the classmate was hospitalized, Wuhan went into lockdown. No matter who messaged in their WeChat group, the classmate never responded. The next time they heard about her was when they learned she had passed away.
The death dealt Mom a major blow. She strained to believe that someone she ate, drank and sang with just 10-plus day ago was gone, just like that. For the longest time, she rarely spoke. Her mood resembled a pinecone that had fell from a tree branch—a constant downward roll. When she felt said, Mom would lock herself in the small garden they kept at home. The flowers were her babies. Sometimes she would just stare at a flower indefinitely.
On April 4, the day of national public mourning for victims of the outbreak, Mom was busy with house chores when the air raid siren sounded. She froze for several seconds before realizing it was time to observe the 3-minute silence. National flags flew at half mast in squares across the country and drivers blared their horns. Many wept.
Mom dug out her sacrificial paper bills—she was supposed to burn them for her late parents on Lunar New Year Eve—and set them aflame in a corner of their residential complex. Open fires are typically banned in the complex, but that day the white circle residue of paper offerings could be seen everywhere.
Mom pulled out part of her stash of bills, drew a circle on the ground with a stone and mumbled her classmate’s name. The relentless smoke from the burning bills left a red tint in Mom’s eyes.
After a friendship of nearly 50 years, little did Mom expect to not be able to see her old friend off in person. The grief was overwhelming and tears fell from her blinking eyes.
***
After Wuhan’s lockdown ended, Mom still didn’t leave home. It was both a matter of nerves and habit.
Dad’s range was a bit broader, but even he was confined to taking out the trash and picking up groceries ordered by group purchase. After walking him through the steps remotely several times, Dad had mastered the tedious process of ordering groceries on his phone. Sometimes he would even brag: “Only 100 bags of the government-issued discount groceries are allocated to each residential complex and I managed to land one. Dad is getting awfully proficient with a smartphone, no?”
Their small garden was the only place Mom could get a breath of fresh air during the first six months of the year. She’d take in the sky, the clouds and passing birds before turning her attention to her flowers. Moments like that were the only respite she enjoyed.
There’s a small park near my own apartment complex that’s my favorite destination. It’s always bustling with young morning joggers, old women dancing or practicing swordplay and elderly men discussing world affairs, as well as the squeals and shouts of children at play. During the quarantine, I always climbed to the rooftop of my building to admire the park from afar, taking in its emptiness. The branches and leaves of the trees grew unchecked into an immense lushness.
When the park reopened in June, it was one of my first stops. The wild grass by the pedestrian paths had already grown to the height of my calves. An old man in his 60s was operating a lawnmower. His hair was completely gray, his shirt lifted over his tummy. When I walked by, apart from the roar of the lawnmower, I could hear him belting the lines from a classic Chinese pop song: “When heaven laughs, it creates ripples in mankind. Lord knows who the winners and losers are.”
After practically begging my parents to leave the house to no avail, I finally forcibly dragged them to the Hankou waterfront district for some fresh air. It was their first foray into the city since the outbreak.
Few people strolled along the waterfront, although the tents set up for public health workers could be found everywhere, a chilling reminder of the aftermath of war. These tents were ubiquitous in the streets of Wuhan, holding fort at the entrances of every residential complex and at every intersection like soldiers on duty. The tents were never removed, just like the masks on the faces of Wuhan residents. Some of the masks came off at the height of summer, but locals still kept them nearby—some merely tugged their masks to chin level while others wore them like an arm patch, ready to swing back into action at a moment’s notice. To some degree, the lukewarm mask wearing mirrored locals’ approach to everyday life at the time.
Even though it had been two months since the end of the lockdown, the streets were sparsely populated except for young men and women who had to go to work. Elderly people were a rarity. The sudden and overwhelming disaster seemed to wreak havoc on the psyche of this demographic more so than in the case of young people, as evidenced by my parents. After an initial phase of absent-mindedness, fear gripped their hearts more quickly and aggressively. Many elderly people preferred to hide out at home, which served as their last harbor against all sorts of sadness in the world.
The Hankou waterfront of early summer is gorgeous. Only a handful of pedestrians could be spotted. The occasional bird chirped from afar. The gentle river breeze was filled with moist. Low clouds hovered above, as if telegraphing imminent rain. Mom and Dad walked side-by-side, taking in their surroundings with the curiosity of newborns. The river water, the reeds, the drooping willows and fishing boats—everything seemed so peaceful and wonderful. They assumed their positions quietly, taking our gazes in stride, seemingly suggesting to us that nothing in them had changed.
I trailed my parents, observing their shadows. When I turned my head I saw a prune tree, the sight of which saddened me. We had missed plum blossom season completely—the prunes were already ripe.
Mom and I started chitchatting. She mentioned her brother-in-law’s younger sister, who came down with a severe case of COVID in February. Her husband was also quarantined. Yet the gamma globulin shots others had gone all out to buy for her couldn’t be delivered to her hospital room. Uncle’s sister was being treated at the suburban Sino-French New City’s branch of Tongji Hospital, about 20 kilometers from downtown. When uncle found out, he immediately put on a disposable raincoat and got ready to make the trip to the hospital by electric bike. My aunt stopped him.
Near tears, my aunt bellowed: “As someone in his 60s, have you considered how your body will cope after riding 20 kilometers in heavy rain on an electric bike? What if you get infected at the hospital? Even if you aren’t afraid, shouldn’t you weigh the impact on members of your own family?”
Uncle didn’t respond, nervously pacing instead. “How is she going to manage if I don’t deliver the medication? She’s my baby sister. My sister is about to die. How can I not give a damn?” Uncle got emotional and let out a primal cry. It was a sound my aunt had never heard before.
I couldn’t help interject: “What about the sister’s own son? Couldn’t he have delivered the medication?”
Mom paused briefly before shaking her head. “Let’s just stay out of other people’s family affairs.”
I felt uncle had suffered an injustice. Mom, on the other hand, was even-keeled, taking a deep sigh instead. “As the ancient saying goes, only the vines torment the tree. The tree never bothers its vines.”
Luckily, uncle’s sister recovered. She thinks God spared her. Her daughter-in-law is about to give birth. If the young couple don’t mind, she’s going to volunteer her childcare services. If they do, she’s going to give them cash, so they can afford the best confinement center and the best toys.
Ending
Someone once asked: “What exactly did this city go through?” I’m sorry, but no one can give a complete answer. Every individual can only piece together bits of the pain and inspiration around him or her and in doing so, heal the emotional wounds to a certain extent.
The tremors we once feared and the late-night tears we shed will fade—or disappear altogether—sooner or later.
There’s just one thing to bear in mind. Never, ever forget what happened.