"Hao, hao! Ganbei!" Dean Chun says, showing his glass, his eyes shining silvery like the alcohol.
"Oh God," I mutter, but smiling. He pours more into my glass, then the bottle circles the table, filling all glasses. The Dean proposes a toast, lifting his firewater high.
"To eternal friendship between Canada and China," Li Ming translates.
"Ganbei! Ganbei!" the Dean says, grinning maniacally. He tilts his glass at me.
"You must drink it in one go," Li Ming says.
"I know. Like the last one."
The Dean downs his with a swift jerk, closing his eyes and then laughing uproariously as he shows the empty bottom. The other men cheer, applaud, point to me. "Ganbei," they say. "Ganbei!"
I drain it. It goes down like fish hooks. I close my eyes and feel the pressure in my temple, then show my glass and try to smile without throwing up.
On with the next course. I don't know how long we've been at it. This is probably number seven. "What is that?" I ask Li Ming.
She confers with the Dean, who explains it confidently, as if he himself has cooked it.
"It is a chicken dish with ginger and lotus root," she says.
I nod at the Dean, showing my appreciation.
"You are the guest, so you should eat a great deal," Li Ming says.
"I'm trying. I don't know how much longer I can keep this up. How many more courses will there be?"
She looks down at her own little dish, which is almost empty, while mine is overflowing with bones and delicate morsels I couldn't manage to swallow. She has the hang of these dinners, not me. "I think perhaps not more than ten or twelve more," she says.
The Dean's chopsticks flick into the big centre plate like deft claws and pull out a gigantic piece which he plops onto my plate before I can defend myself. He grins, showing all his teeth, stained and crooked, except for the silver one in the front.
"What did he say?" I ask Li Ming.
"He says you are young, and can eat a great deal more!"
I nod, trying to find my sense of humour. Then I pick up the strange piece with my chopsticks and turn it around, looking for an opening.
It's a very odd piece, mostly bone from what I can tell. But I'm obliged to give it a go. Then just as I am biting I catch my tongue on something sharp and pull back, look at it again. Two little eyes are staring at me, like a tiny cooked vulture. I nearly drop it.
"Li Ming?"
She is talking to one of the other guests, a professor from the Mathematics Department.
I bump her a bit with my elbow.
"Li Ming," I say in a low voice. "I'm not quite sure what to do with this."
She turns to see what the problem is. "It's the head," she says.
"I know it's the head. Just pretend we're talking about something else. But how do I eat it?"
She puts her hand over her mouth, stifling laughter. "Just put it down on your plate," she says. "If you can't eat it."
"But it's some delicacy or something, isn't it?"
"Doesn't matter," she says, laughing, then reaching into the centre plate with her chopsticks. "Have something else!" She passes me another piece and I casually let the head fall on the huge pile of bones that is accumulating in front of me.
"Ganbei! Hao, hao! Ganbei!" comes the call again, too soon, almost bringing the contents of my stomach to my throat.
More alcohol poured. I lean over to Li Ming. "I'm not sure I can do this," I say to her.
"What do you mean?"
"I mean I've been drinking all night. I don't think I can go much longer."
"Perhaps only six or seven more courses," she says.
"I don't know if I can last six or seven more minutes.
"Ganbei! Ganbei!" goes the Dean, tilting his glass and then proposing his toast.
"To eternal good relations between all men on the earth," Li Ming translates.
"To the greatest good will and harmony between friends!" I say, tilting my glass.
Liquid shards of glass lacerating my throat. My stomach rises. My bum goes off the seat. The air screeches from me like I have been kicked in the abdomen.
My brain starts to implode.
I show my empty cup.
The Dean laughs and laughs and laughs, rubbing his hand over his balding head. Li Ming grips my elbow. I don't know why, but it makes me feel better. More food arrives. Black eggs, buried for four months, staring at me now, waiting for revenge. I have a taste. Nothing. The alcohol has burned out my senses.
"I would like to toast the enduring and unending good relations between the students and faculty of the Laozhou Teacher's College and the people of Canada!" I say, sometime, raising my glass, feeling warm with good humour, the boiled banquet roiling inside me. I have to go the bathroom something horrible. Only the soup left to go. I tilt my glass. Not so bad. Like slowly drinking a headache.
Li Ming is saying something. I have to turn to her. "What?" I say, too loud.
"The Dean says that you can go now, if you like. Unless you are still hungry."
"Still hungry?" I say, my belly suddenly clutched in laughter.
"Can you eat more?"
I can't even talk any more, it seems so funny. The Dean laughs along with me, all the guests are laughing, they have no idea why. Still hungry?
We take our leave. Somehow I control my bladder. We have our coats on and are walking in the cold night air across the compound.
"My friends and I will see you home," Li Ming says.
"No no no no no," I say, suddenly giddy with the word. "I will see you home!"
I stumble for some reason and her friends, two big guys who appear suddenly from out of the night, clutch my arm.
"You are the guest, so we must see you home," she says.
It takes no time at all. One look down at my shoes, another at the cold moon, and we are there.
"I don't know. Are those the same stars as at home?" I ask.
"Have you got your key?" she says.
"Key, yes. Key! But, those stars. I don't remember any of them at home."
"I don't know much about stars," she says. She has the key for some reason, and opens the door, turning on the light, so bright it makes me woozy.
She speaks Chinese to the men, who very cleverly understand her, and then they are guiding me into the bedroom.
"Can you manage?" she asks from the other room.
"Yes. Yes!" I say, falling over onto the bed as a joke but missing it, and then I'm on the floor cold, like a bathroom floor on one of those nights ....
The two guys help me up. I start to peel off my jacket. Then they take off my shoes and I am in the bed with the comforter over me, and it is so dark but I can see her perfectly as she peers around the doorframe into my room, her black eyes, the way her hair hooks back behind her ears.
"Are you all right?"
"Yes. Wonderful," I say. "I should walk you home."
"No, thank you," she says, and her smile is a quick flash of white.
"You walked me home. I should walk you home."
"Another time, perhaps."
"Yes. Okay. Another time," I say.
"Good night."
"Good night, Li Ming." Her feet tread lightly beside the heavy feet of the others, and the light in the other room falls shut, and I am lying here, warm, needing to go the bathroom. But in a minute. It is a fine thing just to be still, thinking of what it would be like to be married to Li Ming.
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