After leaving Cliff’s house, Aston and Qin Siyu walked together down the street.
They followed the slope downhill toward the sea.
Beautiful houses stood on both sides, their lights glowing. The ocean surged in the distance, and they could hear it and smell the salt in the air.
The moon was bright. Now and then, a few wisps of cloud drifted past, making it seem shy and bashful.
Down the sloping street they walked, farther and farther down.
Even knowing they had no future, Qin Siyu was exhilarated beyond measure.
His lips and tongue still burned, almost as if they might burst. Who would have imagined that entwining and rubbing against another person’s mouth could feel so wondrous? Even now, merely imagining kissing again made his skin prickle and his hair stand on end. Tiny bumps sprang up all over him. He wanted more, and then still more. He wanted their lips and tongues never to part.
Aston felt exactly the same.
Falling from grace tasted so sweet.
Perhaps Adam had never regretted his expulsion from the Garden of Eden, nor ever wished to return to God’s side.
Neither quite knew why, but after kissing in the dark, something seemed to have opened like a floodgate. They desperately wanted to touch each other: to embrace, to kiss, to lace their fingers tightly together, to leave their scent all over the other’s body, and to have the other’s marks all over their own.
They kept reliving it, memorizing it, wanting to brand every sensation into their minds and dissolve it into their bones.
It was almost unbearable to hold back.
But… now they had no pretext.
The excuse of ‘mistaking someone for somebody else in the dark’ was gone.
If they crossed the line here, they really would be plunging into the abyss, dragging the other man down with them.
They had to stay clearheaded.
So they began seeking opportunities to quench their thirst by drinking poison.
Summer nights were cold on the high ground beside the San Francisco waterfront. Aston draped his thick coat over Qin Siyu.
‘…’ Qin Siyu pulled the lapels tightly together and drew them up beneath his lips, wrapping himself entirely in the heavy coat.
Aston glanced at him.
The fabric of the collar brushed up and down beneath Qin Siyu’s chin in time with his steps, but never quite reached his lips.
The slope was steep. His lips parted slightly as he breathed.
After a while a cool evening breeze swept past. At last Qin Siyu moved his fingers again, turned up the collar, and raised the fabric to cover his nose and mouth, hiding inside.
They both understood without saying a word.
With both hands clutching the collar over his mouth and nose, Qin Siyu breathed in Aston’s scent lingering on the fabric. He turned his eyes toward Aston, too.
Whenever he looked sidelong at someone from those upswept outer corners, he was irresistibly alluring.
He felt as though they were playing a game of enticing each other.
That way, if the other person crossed the line first, he could feel a little less guilty.
They continued toward the sea.
A small symbol had been drawn on the front door of one house.
Qin Siyu lowered his collar, suddenly interested. ‘Kingsley, do you know what this means?’
‘What?’ Aston asked.
‘It means the people here have some work they need us to do. Since the Depression began, unemployed people have gone door to door knocking. If someone actually finds work and gets paid, they leave a sign somewhere discreet to tell whoever comes after that the household is friendly and worth a try. Later, some homeowners started making these marks themselves to mean, “There’s a job here.” Anyone who spots one can knock and take the work.’
Aston looked at Qin Siyu.
Qin Siyu tugged on his arm. ‘Shall we try, Master?’
‘All right,’ Aston said.
Qin Siyu went to knock.
Before long, a woman opened the door. Qin Siyu asked, ‘Excuse me, is there any work to be done? I can do it.’
The woman’s gaze traveled over Aston. She hesitated for several seconds, recognizing the wealth in everything about him. But when her eyes returned to Qin Siyu’s face, she thought for a moment and stepped outside. ‘The roots of a tree in our yard have reached the fence. Could you cut that tree down for us?’
‘Of course,’ Qin Siyu said.
She brought out an axe and an oil lamp.
Qin Siyu set the lamp on the ground, bent forward slightly, and looked up. He tapped the trunk with the fingertips of one hand and brought the axe down with the other. There was a dull crack as he neatly chopped a long gash into the wood.
Keeping one hand against the tree, he swung the axe again and again, each blow landing in the same spot. Aston’s heart jumped every time. The notch grew wider and wider, but Qin Siyu never stopped. His face expressionless, he swung over and over until he had almost cut halfway through the trunk.
‘…’ Once he’d chopped halfway through, Qin Siyu paused and asked Aston, ‘Want to try?’
‘All right,’ Aston said again.
He rolled up his sleeves and accepted the tool. The handle still held Qin Siyu’s warmth.
Qin Siyu stepped back and instructed him. ‘Keep striking right here. It’ll come down soon.’
‘Mm.’
Aston’s fringe fell over his forehead, looking like golden threads in the lamplight.
He, too, rested a hand against the trunk. Having never done this before, he was extraordinarily serious and completely focused, even more so than when he took part in competitions at school. At first he didn’t use much force, concentrating on accuracy. After a few strokes, however, he found his rhythm, bringing the blade down into the notch again and again. He really seemed to be learning.
Seeing that the young master genuinely seemed about to master the skill, Qin Siyu laughed without quite knowing why.
Aston sensed his mood, looked up, and saw him smiling. His own lips curved involuntarily. For several seconds the two smiled at each other while the wind stirred their hair. Then Aston, still smiling, bent down and went back to chopping.
Partway through, Aston’s cuff slipped down. He stopped, and Qin Siyu came forward. ‘Your hand.’
Aston lifted his wrist. Qin Siyu lightly pinched the cuff and folded it up once, then once more.
As he rolled the sleeve, his fingertips unavoidably brushed against Aston through the cloth. He looked up and found Aston gazing at him intensely, his eyes dark blue beneath the dim lamplight.
Qin Siyu lowered his head again and went on rolling.
But this time he deliberately let his fingertips graze Aston’s forearm with every fold, stroking lightly and shallowly through the shirt. In the night, he could hear Aston breathing long and deeply.
Qin Siyu knew perfectly well that he was being bad.
‘There.’ When the sleeve was finally rolled up, he stepped away and directed, ‘Carry on.’
Aston lowered his arm, holding the axe, the strong tendons at his wrist standing out.
After a while Qin Siyu said, ‘You don’t need to brace the trunk for the last few blows. It’ll fall that way on its own.’
‘Got it.’ Aston swung twice more. With a rush, the tree toppled obediently to one side.
‘Beautiful!’ Qin Siyu took back the axe and tugged Aston’s arm. ‘Come on, let’s collect our wages!’
The woman was generous and gave them two dollars altogether.
Qin Siyu handed Aston one dollar. ‘Here.’
‘I—’
‘You have to take it.’
‘All right.’ Aston gave a small nod. They divided their pay, and when each slipped a dollar into his wallet, both burst out laughing at the same moment.
Aston rarely smiled, but Qin Siyu sincerely thought he was captivating when he did, like an icy sky touched by the first light of dawn.
Kingsley Aston felt something similar: when he was with Qin Siyu, it was as though he lived two different lives.
Because of Qin Siyu, he seemed to have been given two entirely different lives.
After leaving the house, they continued downhill.
‘I never knew the story behind those symbols,’ Aston said.
‘Mm.’ Qin Siyu gazed out at the sea. ‘Sometimes I use them to find odd jobs and earn a little money. But I’ve noticed something—’
‘What?’
‘People like me aren’t necessarily the worst victims of the Depression. As you can see… at the very least, there are times when we can get help.’
‘So—’
Qin Siyu said, ‘I’ve noticed that whenever people offer help, the people they’re thinking of helping are men.’
Aston looked at him.
‘Every job seems intended for a man. Of course women could do them, too, but they’re usually overlooked.’
During the prosperous twenties, employers had eagerly hired female secretaries, personal assistants, and typists. Their motives hadn’t been concern for women’s welfare. They’d been looking after themselves.
But as soon as the Great Depression came, men suddenly wanted to drive women back into their homes. More than eighty percent of Americans opposed women working outside the home, calling them ‘selfish’ and ‘shortsighted.’ For instance, over half the states had introduced restrictions in recent years intended to secure jobs for men, barring married women from government employment. Most banks, schools, and large companies also refused to employ married women.
Elio’s Notes: The novel describes married women’s employment bans as already existing in over half of US states at this point in 1933. Such ‘marriage bars’ did exist before the Depression and expanded during the 1930s, but the widely cited 26-state figure refers to states that had proposed government-employment restrictions by 1940, not 26 state bans already enacted in 1933. A discriminatory federal rule was introduced in 1932. The characters’ historical discussion is translated as written. Source: HISTORY, marriage bars during the Great Depression.
Now, admittedly, Roosevelt’s wife Eleanor Roosevelt was encouraging women to work, and the first woman to hold a cabinet position, Secretary of Labor Frances Perkins, had changed her position and begun supporting them as well… But who could tell what would happen in the future?
‘Things are so much harder for them. That’s why… sometimes I really admire them,’ Qin Siyu said. ‘Even opposed and hemmed in from all sides, made targets of public anger, they’ve continued finding ways to grow. The number of women working hasn’t fallen. It’s actually rising.’
Under the shadow of the Depression, women’s need for employment had reached unprecedented heights. A family was naturally more likely to earn something if both spouses sought work instead of relying on the husband alone. And sectors that employed many women, such as food production and textiles, had suffered less from the Depression. Women were also often willing to endure almost any work, with long hours and low pay.
Qin Siyu spoke calmly, but Aston felt once more that being beside him would make a person happy: as his patient, his colleague, his friend, his family… his lover.
They walked all the way to the shore.
The Golden Gate Bridge was under construction, and ferries moved back and forth across the water.
The engineer Joseph Strauss had become obsessed with the idea, spending ten years lobbying everyone to accept that his proposal was feasible. In the end, despite fierce opposition from conservationists, ferry companies, and others, San Francisco residents had approved the scheme amid the Depression. They’d pledged all manner of city assets as security and issued thirty-five million dollars in bonds to build the bridge.
Qin Siyu was looking forward to it because Kingsley had said it would be beautiful.
‘Kingsley,’ Qin Siyu said, dawdling a little, ‘I need to catch the bus.’
Aston’s steps faltered briefly, then he caught up. ‘Mm.’
They turned toward the bus stop. Halfway there, it began to rain again.
Could it really rain at this time of year?
But neither hurried. They kept walking slowly, letting raindrops fall over them.
Qin Siyu even took off the coat and carried it in one hand, walking shoulder to shoulder with Aston toward the stop.
Amid the fine, dense rain, they seemed cut off from the entire world.
Standing beneath the awning at the stop, Qin Siyu said, ‘Kingsley, I start volunteering at the hospital tomorrow.’
Aston paused again. ‘All right.’
‘I probably won’t get to see you very often. Until now I’ve been living at school, but afterward… I’ll be staying at home.’
‘All right,’ Aston repeated.
‘Since we won’t get to see each other much,’ Qin Siyu asked, ‘shall we hug before we say goodbye?’
Aston turned toward him. ‘Of course.’
With both of them willing, they embraced.
Both bodies were soaked, almost as though the rain had fallen for this very moment.
The fabric was wet, thin, almost transparent, clinging tightly to their bodies.
Through it, they could feel each other’s outlines more keenly: young, solid, resilient.
The warmth of their bodies spread outward. Cold droplets grew warm against their skin until their temperatures mingled.
Water passed from one man to the other through the cloth, or traveled back again.
They held each other tightly. Qin Siyu pressed close, closed his eyes, and rested his chin on one of Aston’s shoulders.
It was nowhere near enough.
They ought to tear the clothes away, lick off every droplet, and take it into themselves.
They stood silently embracing for a long time, until the bus was about to arrive.
Reluctantly, Qin Siyu drew back and said, ‘Bye-bye.’
‘Mm.’ Aston accepted his coat. ‘See you.’
Qin Siyu darted onto the bus.
There were only a few passengers. He found a seat in the very last row.
Tonight he had kissed a man.
Qin Siyu thought: he had an enormous secret now.
He couldn’t help looking at the other passengers. Men, women, old people, children, white people, men… and wondering: Could their lives withstand close examination and scrutiny?
What secrets did they have?
If their masks were torn away, would their closest relatives, friends, and teachers all cry out in shock?
The bus rattled through the rain-soaked streets.
His clothes gradually dried.
Qin Siyu’s entire body prickled.
Just now, they’d deliberately allowed their clothes to become wet, then held each other.
Now the fabric was drying, and the droplets that had mingled between them seemed to cling to his skin and sink beneath it.
Invaded. Possessed.
He lowered his eyes, feeling a private, trembling pleasure. A prickling warmth spread across his chest and lower abdomen, as though, in a certain sense, the other man really had entered his body and marked him as his own.