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当华美的叶片落尽，生命的脉络才历历可见..
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The Paper Menagerie
One of my earliest memories starts with me sobbing. I refused to be soothed no matter what Mom and Dad tried.
Dad gave up and left the bedroom, but Mom took me into the kitchen and sat me down at the breakfast table.
“Kan, kan,” she said, as she pulled a sheet of wrapping paper from on top of the fridge. For years, Mom carefully sliced open the wrappings around Christmas gifts and saved them on top of the fridge in a thick stack.
She set the paper down, plain side facing up, and began to fold it. I stopped crying and watched her, curious.
She turned the paper over and folded it again. She pleated, packed, tucked, rolled, and twisted until the paper disappeared between her cupped hands. Then she lifted the folded-up paper packet to her mouth and blew into it, like a balloon.
“Kan,” she said. “Laohu.” She put her hands down on the table and let go.
A little paper tiger stood on the table, the size of two fists placed together. The skin of the tiger was the pattern on the wrapping paper, white background with red candy canes and green Christmas trees.
I reached out to Mom’s creation. Its tail twitched, and it pounced playfully at my finger. “Rawrr-sa,” it growled, the sound somewhere between a cat and rustling newspapers.
I laughed, startled, and stroked its back with an index finger. The paper tiger vibrated under my finger, purring.
“Zhe jiao zhezhi,” Mom said. This is called origami.
I didn’t know this at the time, but Mom’s kind was special. She breathed into them so that they shared her breath, and thus moved with her life. This was her magic.
#
Dad had picked Mom out of a catalog.
One time, when I was in high school, I asked Dad about the details. He was trying to get me to speak to Mom again.
He had signed up for the introduction service back in the spring of 1973. Flipping through the pages steadily, he had spent no more than a few seconds on each page until he saw the picture of Mom.
I’ve never seen this picture. Dad described it: Mom was sitting in a chair, her side to the camera, wearing a tight green silk cheongsam. Her head was turned to the camera so that her long black hair was draped artfully over her chest and shoulder. She looked out at him with the eyes of a calm child.
“That was the last page of the catalog I saw,” he said.
The catalog said she was eighteen, loved to dance, and spoke good English because she was from Hong Kong. None of these facts turned out to be true.
He wrote to her, and the company passed their messages back and forth. Finally, he flew to Hong Kong to meet her.
“The people at the company had been writing her responses. She didn’t know any English other than ‘hello’ and ‘goodbye.’”
What kind of woman puts herself into a catalog so that she can be bought? The high school me thought I knew so much about everything. Contempt felt good, like wine.
Instead of storming into the office to demand his money back, he paid a waitress at the hotel restaurant to translate for them.
“She would look at me, her eyes halfway between scared and hopeful, while I spoke. And when the girl began translating what I said, she’d start to smile slowly.”
He flew back to Connecticut and began to apply for the papers for her to come to him. I was born a year later, in the Year of the Tiger.
#
At my request, Mom also made a goat, a deer, and a water buffalo out of wrapping paper. They would run around the living room while Laohu chased after them, growling. When he caught them he would press down until the air went out of them and they became just flat, folded-up pieces of paper. I would then have to blow into them to re-inflate them so they could run around some more.
Sometimes, the animals got into trouble. Once, the water buffalo jumped into a dish of soy sauce on the table at dinner. (He wanted to wallow, like a real water buffalo.) I picked him out quickly but the capillary action had already pulled the dark liquid high up into his legs. The sauce-softened legs would not hold him up, and he collapsed onto the table. I dried him out in the sun, but his legs became crooked after that, and he ran around with a limp. Mom eventually wrapped his legs in saran wrap so that he could wallow to his heart’s content (just not in soy sauce).
Also, Laohu liked to pounce at sparrows when he and I played in the backyard. But one time, a cornered bird struck back in desperation and tore his ear. He whimpered and winced as I held him and Mom patched his ear together with tape. He avoided birds after that.
And then one day, I saw a TV documentary about sharks and asked Mom for one of my own. She made the shark, but he flapped about on the table unhappily. I filled the sink with water, and put him in. He swam around and around happily. However, after a while he became soggy and translucent, and slowly sank to the bottom, the folds coming undone. I reached in to rescue him, and all I ended up with was a wet piece of paper.
Laohu put his front paws together at the edge of the sink and rested his head on them. Ears drooping, he made a low growl in his throat that made me feel guilty.
Mom made a new shark for me, this time out of tin foil. The shark lived happily in a large goldfish bowl. Laohu and I liked to sit next to the bowl to watch the tin foil shark chasing the goldfish, Laohu sticking his face up against the bowl on the other side so that I saw his eyes, magnified to the size of coffee cups, staring at me from across the bowl.
#
When I was ten, we moved to a new house across town. Two of the women neighbors came by to welcome us. Dad served them drinks and then apologized for having to run off to the utility company to straighten out the prior owner’s bills. “Make yourselves at home. My wife doesn’t speak much English, so don’t think she’s being rude for not talking to you.”
While I read in the dining room, Mom unpacked in the kitchen. The neighbors conversed in the living room, not trying to be particularly quiet.
“He seems like a normal enough man. Why did he do that?”
“Something about the mixing never seems right. The child looks unfinished. Slanty eyes, white face. A little monster.”
“Do you think he can speak English?”
The women hushed. After a while they came into the dining room.
“Hello there! What’s your name?”
“Jack,” I said.
“That doesn’t sound very Chinesey.”
Mom came into the dining room then. She smiled at the women. The three of them stood in a triangle around me, smiling and nodding at each other, with nothing to say, until Dad came back.
#
Mark, one of the neighborhood boys, came over with his Star Wars action figures. Obi-Wan Kenobi’s lightsaber lit up and he could swing his arms and say, in a tinny voice, “Use the Force!” I didn’t think the figure looked much like the real Obi-Wan at all.
Together, we watched him repeat this performance five times on the coffee table. “Can he do anything else?” I asked.
Mark was annoyed by my question. “Look at all the details,” he said.
I looked at the details. I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to say.
Mark was disappointed by my response. “Show me your toys.”
I didn’t have any toys except my paper menagerie. I brought Laohu out from my bedroom. By then he was very worn, patched all over with tape and glue, evidence of the years of repairs Mom and I had done on him. He was no longer as nimble and sure-footed as before. I sat him down on the coffee table. I could hear the skittering steps of the other animals behind in the hallway, timidly peeking into the living room.
“Xiao laohu,” I said, and stopped. I switched to English. “This is Tiger.” Cautiously, Laohu strode up and purred at Mark, sniffing his hands.
Mark examined the Christmas-wrap pattern of Laohu’s skin. “That doesn’t look like a tiger at all. Your Mom makes toys for you from trash?”
I had never thought of Laohu as trash. But looking at him now, he was really just a piece of wrapping paper.
Mark pushed Obi-Wan’s head again. The lightsaber flashed; he moved his arms up and down. “Use the Force!”
Laohu turned and pounced, knocking the plastic figure off the table. It hit the floor and broke, and Obi-Wan’s head rolled under the couch. “Rawwww,” Laohu laughed. I joined him.
Mark punched me, hard. “This was very expensive! You can’t even find it in the stores now. It probably cost more than what your dad paid for your mom!”
I stumbled and fell to the floor. Laohu growled and leapt at Mark’s face.
Mark screamed, more out of fear and surprise than pain. Laohu was only made of paper, after all.
Mark grabbed Laohu and his snarl was choked off as Mark crumpled him in his hand and tore him in half. He balled up the two pieces of paper and threw them at me. “Here’s your stupid cheap Chinese garbage.”
After Mark left, I spent a long time trying, without success, to tape together the pieces, smooth out the paper, and follow the creases to refold Laohu. Slowly, the other animals came into the living room and gathered around us, me and the torn wrapping paper that used to be Laohu.
#
My fight with Mark didn’t end there. Mark was popular at school. I never want to think again about the two weeks that followed.
I came home that Friday at the end of the two weeks. “Xuexiao hao ma?” Mom asked. I said nothing and went to the bathroom. I looked into the mirror. I look nothing like her, nothing.
At dinner I asked Dad, “Do I have a chink face?”
Dad put down his chopsticks. Even though I had never told him what happened in school, he seemed to understand. He closed his eyes and rubbed the bridge of his nose. “No, you don’t.”
Mom looked at Dad, not understanding. She looked back at me. “Sha jiao chink?”
“English,” I said. “Speak English.”
She tried. “What happen?”
I pushed the chopsticks and the bowl before me away: stir-fried green peppers with five-spice beef. “We should eat American food.”
Dad tried to reason. “A lot of families cook Chinese sometimes.”
“We are not other families.” I looked at him. Other families don’t have moms who don’t belong.
He looked away. And then he put a hand on Mom’s shoulder. “I’ll get you a cookbook.”
Mom turned to me. “Bu haochi?”
“English,” I said, raising my voice. “Speak English.”
Mom reached out to touch my forehead, feeling for my temperature. “Fashao la?”
I brushed her hand away. “I’m fine. Speak English!” I was shouting.
“Speak English to him,” Dad said to Mom. “You knew this was going to happen some day. What did you expect?”
Mom dropped her hands to her side. She sat, looking from Dad to me, and back to Dad again. She tried to speak, stopped, and tried again, and stopped again.
“You have to,” Dad said. “I’ve been too easy on you. Jack needs to fit in.”
Mom looked at him. “If I say ‘love,’ I feel here.” She pointed to her lips. “If I say ‘ai,‘ I feel here.” She put her hand over her heart.
Dad shook his head. “You are in America.”
Mom hunched down in her seat, looking like the water buffalo when Laohu used to pounce on him and squeeze the air of life out of him.
“And I want some real toys.”
#
Dad bought me a full set of Star Wars action figures. I gave the Obi-Wan Kenobi to Mark.
I packed the paper menagerie in a large shoebox and put it under the bed.
The next morning, the animals had escaped and took over their old favorite spots in my room. I caught them all and put them back into the shoebox, taping the lid shut. But the animals made so much noise in the box that I finally shoved it into the corner of the attic as far away from my room as possible.
If Mom spoke to me in Chinese, I refused to answer her. After a while, she tried to use more English. But her accent and broken sentences embarrassed me. I tried to correct her. Eventually, she stopped speaking altogether if I were around.
Mom began to mime things if she needed to let me know something. She tried to hug me the way she saw American mothers did on TV. I thought her movements exaggerated, uncertain, ridiculous, graceless. She saw that I was annoyed, and stopped.
“You shouldn’t treat your mother that way,” Dad said. But he couldn’t look me in the eyes as he said it. Deep in his heart, he must have realized that it was a mistake to have tried to take a Chinese peasant girl and expect her to fit in the suburbs of Connecticut.
Mom learned to cook American style. I played video games and studied French.
Every once in a while, I would see her at the kitchen table studying the plain side of a sheet of wrapping paper. Later a new paper animal would appear on my nightstand and try to cuddle up to me. I caught them, squeezed them until the air went out of them, and then stuffed them away in the box in the attic.
Mom finally stopped making the animals when I was in high school. By then her English was much better, but I was already at that age when I wasn’t interested in what she had to say whatever language she used.
Sometimes, when I came home and saw her tiny body busily moving about in the kitchen, singing a song in Chinese to herself, it was hard for me to believe that she gave birth to me. We had nothing in common. She might as well be from the moon. I would hurry on to my room, where I could continue my all-American pursuit of happiness.
#
Dad and I stood, one on each side of Mom, lying on the hospital bed. She was not yet even forty, but she looked much older.
For years she had refused to go to the doctor for the pain inside her that she said was no big deal. By the time an ambulance finally carried her in, the cancer had spread far beyond the limits of surgery.
My mind was not in the room. It was the middle of the on-campus recruiting season, and I was focused on resumes, transcripts, and strategically constructed interview schedules. I schemed about how to lie to the corporate recruiters most effectively so that they’ll offer to buy me. I understood intellectually that it was terrible to think about this while your mother lay dying. But that understanding didn’t mean I could change how I felt.
She was conscious. Dad held her left hand with both of his own. He leaned down to kiss her forehead. He seemed weak and old in a way that startled me. I realized that I knew almost as little about Dad as I did about Mom.
Mom smiled at him. “I’m fine.”
She turned to me, still smiling. “I know you have to go back to school.” Her voice was very weak and it was difficult to hear her over the hum of the machines hooked up to her. “Go. Don’t worry about me. This is not a big deal. Just do well in school.”
I reached out to touch her hand, because I thought that was what I was supposed to do. I was relieved. I was already thinking about the flight back, and the bright California sunshine.
She whispered something to Dad. He nodded and left the room.
“Jack, if—” she was caught up in a fit of coughing, and could not speak for some time. “If I don’t make it, don’t be too sad and hurt your health. Focus on your life. Just keep that box you have in the attic with you, and every year, at Qingming, just take it out and think about me. I’ll be with you always.”
Qingming was the Chinese Festival for the Dead. When I was very young, Mom used to write a letter on Qingming to her dead parents back in China, telling them the good news about the past year of her life in America. She would read the letter out loud to me, and if I made a comment about something, she would write it down in the letter too. Then she would fold the letter into a paper crane, and release it, facing west. We would then watch, as the crane flapped its crisp wings on its long journey west, towards the Pacific, towards China, towards the graves of Mom’s family.
It had been many years since I last did that with her.
“I don’t know anything about the Chinese calendar,” I said. “Just rest, Mom. ”
“Just keep the box with you and open it once in a while. Just open—” she began to cough again.
“It’s okay, Mom.” I stroked her arm awkwardly.
“Haizi, mama ai ni—” Her cough took over again. An image from years ago flashed into my memory: Mom saying ai and then putting her hand over her heart.
“Alright, Mom. Stop talking.”
Dad came back, and I said that I needed to get to the airport early because I didn’t want to miss my flight.
She died when my plane was somewhere over Nevada.
#
Dad aged rapidly after Mom died. The house was too big for him and had to be sold. My girlfriend Susan and I went to help him pack and clean the place.
Susan found the shoebox in the attic. The paper menagerie, hidden in the uninsulated darkness of the attic for so long, had become brittle and the bright wrapping paper patterns had faded.
“I’ve never seen origami like this,” Susan said. “Your Mom was an amazing artist.”
The paper animals did not move. Perhaps whatever magic had animated them stopped when Mom died. Or perhaps I had only imagined that these paper constructions were once alive. The memory of children could not be trusted.
#
It was the first weekend in April, two years after Mom’s death. Susan was out of town on one of her endless trips as a management consultant and I was home, lazily flipping through the TV channels.
I paused at a documentary about sharks. Suddenly I saw, in my mind, Mom’s hands, as they folded and refolded tin foil to make a shark for me, while Laohu and I watched.
A rustle. I looked up and saw that a ball of wrapping paper and torn tape was on the floor next to the bookshelf. I walked over to pick it up for the trash.
The ball of paper shifted, unfurled itself, and I saw that it was Laohu, who I hadn’t thought about in a very long time. “Rawrr-sa.” Mom must have put him back together after I had given up.
He was smaller than I remembered. Or maybe it was just that back then my fists were smaller.
Susan had put the paper animals around our apartment as decoration. She probably left Laohu in a pretty hidden corner because he looked so shabby.
I sat down on the floor, and reached out a finger. Laohu’s tail twitched, and he pounced playfully. I laughed, stroking his back. Laohu purred under my hand.
“How’ve you been, old buddy?”
Laohu stopped playing. He got up, jumped with feline grace into my lap, and proceeded to unfold himself.
In my lap was a square of creased wrapping paper, the plain side up. It was filled with dense Chinese characters. I had never learned to read Chinese, but I knew the characters for son, and they were at the top, where you’d expect them in a letter addressed to you, written in Mom’s awkward, childish handwriting.
I went to the computer to check the Internet. Today was Qingming.
#
I took the letter with me downtown, where I knew the Chinese tour buses stopped. I stopped every tourist, asking, “Nin hui du zhongwen ma?” Can you read Chinese? I hadn’t spoken Chinese in so long that I wasn’t sure if they understood.
A young woman agreed to help. We sat down on a bench together, and she read the letter to me aloud. The language that I had tried to forget for years came back, and I felt the words sinking into me, through my skin, through my bones, until they squeezed tight around my heart.
#
Son,
We haven’t talked in a long time. You are so angry when I try to touch you that I’m afraid. And I think maybe this pain I feel all the time now is something serious.
So I decided to write to you. I’m going to write in the paper animals I made for you that you used to like so much.
The animals will stop moving when I stop breathing. But if I write to you with all my heart, I’ll leave a little of myself behind on this paper, in these words. Then, if you think of me on Qingming, when the spirits of the departed are allowed to visit their families, you’ll make the parts of myself I leave behind come alive too. The creatures I made for you will again leap and run and pounce, and maybe you’ll get to see these words then.
Because I have to write with all my heart, I need to write to you in Chinese.
All this time I still haven’t told you the story of my life. When you were little, I always thought I’d tell you the story when you were older, so you could understand. But somehow that chance never came up.
I was born in 1957, in Sigulu Village, Hebei Province. Your grandparents were both from very poor peasant families with few relatives. Only a few years after I was born, the Great Famines struck China, during which thirty million people died. The first memory I have was waking up to see my mother eating dirt so that she could fill her belly and leave the last bit of flour for me.
Things got better after that. Sigulu is famous for its zhezhi papercraft, and my mother taught me how to make paper animals and give them life. This was practical magic in the life of the village. We made paper birds to chase grasshoppers away from the fields, and paper tigers to keep away the mice. For Chinese New Year my friends and I made red paper dragons. I’ll never forget the sight of all those little dragons zooming across the sky overhead, holding up strings of exploding firecrackers to scare away all the bad memories of the past year. You would have loved it.
Then came the Cultural Revolution in 1966. Neighbor turned on neighbor, and brother against brother. Someone remembered that my mother’s brother, my uncle, had left for Hong Kong back in 1946, and became a merchant there. Having a relative in Hong Kong meant we were spies and enemies of the people, and we had to be struggled against in every way. Your poor grandmother — she couldn’t take the abuse and threw herself down a well. Then some boys with hunting muskets dragged your grandfather away one day into the woods, and he never came back.
There I was, a ten-year-old orphan. The only relative I had in the world was my uncle in Hong Kong. I snuck away one night and climbed onto a freight train going south.
Down in Guangdong Province a few days later, some men caught me stealing food from a field. When they heard that I was trying to get to Hong Kong, they laughed. “It’s your lucky day. Our trade is to bring girls to Hong Kong.”
They hid me in the bottom of a truck along with other girls, and smuggled us across the border.
We were taken to a basement and told to stand up and look healthy and intelligent for the buyers. Families paid the warehouse a fee and came by to look us over and select one of us to “adopt.”
The Chin family picked me to take care of their two boys. I got up every morning at four to prepare breakfast. I fed and bathed the boys. I shopped for food. I did the laundry and swept the floors. I followed the boys around and did their bidding. At night I was locked into a cupboard in the kitchen to sleep. If I was slow or did anything wrong I was beaten. If the boys did anything wrong I was beaten. If I was caught trying to learn English I was beaten.
“Why do you want to learn English?” Mr. Chin asked. “You want to go to the police? We’ll tell the police that you are a mainlander illegally in Hong Kong. They’d love to have you in their prison.”
Six years I lived like this. One day, an old woman who sold fish to me in the morning market pulled me aside.
“I know girls like you. How old are you now, sixteen? One day, the man who owns you will get drunk, and he’ll look at you and pull you to him and you can’t stop him. The wife will find out, and then you will think you really have gone to hell. You have to get out of this life. I know someone who can help.”
She told me about American men who wanted Asian wives. If I can cook, clean, and take care of my American husband, he’ll give me a good life. It was the only hope I had. And that was how I got into the catalog with all those lies and met your father. It is not a very romantic story, but it is my story.
In the suburbs of Connecticut, I was lonely. Your father was kind and gentle with me, and I was very grateful to him. But no one understood me, and I understood nothing.
But then you were born! I was so happy when I looked into your face and saw shades of my mother, my father, and myself. I had lost my entire family, all of Sigulu, everything I ever knew and loved. But there you were, and your face was proof that they were real. I hadn’t made them up.
Now I had someone to talk to. I would teach you my language, and we could together remake a small piece of everything that I loved and lost. When you said your first words to me, in Chinese that had the same accent as my mother and me, I cried for hours. When I made the first zhezhi animals for you, and you laughed, I felt there were no worries in the world.
You grew up a little, and now you could even help your father and I talk to each other. I was really at home now. I finally found a good life. I wished my parents could be here, so that I could cook for them, and give them a good life too. But my parents were no longer around. You know what the Chinese think is the saddest feeling in the world? It’s for a child to finally grow the desire to take care of his parents, only to realize that they were long gone.
Son, I know that you do not like your Chinese eyes, which are my eyes. I know that you do not like your Chinese hair, which is my hair. But can you understand how much joy your very existence brought to me? And can you understand how it felt when you stopped talking to me and won’t let me talk to you in Chinese? I felt I was losing everything all over again.
Why won’t you talk to me, son? The pain makes it hard to write.
#
The young woman handed the paper back to me. I could not bear to look into her face.
Without looking up, I asked for her help in tracing out the character for ai on the paper below Mom’s letter. I wrote the character again and again on the paper, intertwining my pen strokes with her words.
The young woman reached out and put a hand on my shoulder. Then she got up and left, leaving me alone with my mother.
Following the creases, I refolded the paper back into Laohu. I cradled him in the crook of my arm, and as he purred, we began the walk home.
我最早的记忆之一，是以我的啜泣开头的。不管爸爸妈妈怎么哄我，我都不肯消停。
爸爸无奈的离开了我的床边，而妈妈把我带到厨房，把我安坐在餐桌旁。
“汗，汗，” 她边说边从冰箱顶上抽出一张礼品包装纸。一年又一年，妈妈小心翼翼的裁开圣诞礼物上的包装纸，再收好到冰箱顶上，攒了厚厚一沓。
她把纸平铺开，没有图案的一面向上，然后折了一下。我停止了哭闹，好奇地望着她。
她把纸翻了一面，又折了一下。她折、捏、掖、卷、揉……直到纸的原形在她合拢的双掌里消失。她将那折起的小团举向嘴边，往里吹气，像吹一个气球。
“汗，”她说，“老辅。”她把手低向桌面，摊开双掌。
一只小小的纸老虎站在桌上，像两只握紧的拳头一块儿那么大。虎皮是包装纸的图案，银白的底色，排布着红色的棒棒糖和绿色的圣诞树。
我把手伸向妈妈的创作。它的尾巴晃了晃，欢快地蹦向我的手指。“嗷~沙~”它吼道，像是介于猫儿的喵呜和翻报纸的沙沙作响之间的某种声音。
“则叫则子。”妈妈说——这叫折纸。
我那时还不知道：妈妈的折纸与别人的不同。她对折纸吹气，因而它们分享了她的呼吸，与她的生命共舞。这是她的秘法。
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爸爸是从一本目录里挑中妈妈的。
有一次，当我上高中的时候，我问了爸爸详情。他那时正努力让我乐意再和妈妈说话。
1973年的春天，他签约了婚介服务。他有条不紊地翻着名录，一页不过瞄上几秒，直到妈妈的相片映入眼帘。
我从来也没见过这张照片，爸爸这样描述它：妈妈坐在一张椅子上，侧身对着相机，穿着一件贴身的绿色旗袍。她把头转过来正对镜头，一头乌黑长发于是滩过肩膀，瀑落胸前，如诗如画。她从照片里看着他，用宁静的稚子般的眼睛。
“我再也没有多翻一页。”他说。
目录上说她十八岁，能歌善舞，英语流利，因为她来自香港。这些没有一样是真的。
他给她写信，婚介公司帮他俩来回通讯。最终，他飞到香港去见她。
“她的回信都是公司的人写的。除了’你好’和’再见’，她一句英文也不会。”爸爸说。
什么样的女人才会把自己放进一个可以待价而沽的商品目录里？——高中生的我觉得自己什么都懂。轻蔑的感觉不错，就像酒一样。
爸爸没有选择怒冲冲地找婚介公司算账，他就地在宾馆的餐厅雇来一位女服务生，为他们当翻译。
“当我说话的时候她会看着我，眼神一半是畏惧，一半是期待。当那个女孩开始翻译我说的话时，她就渐渐地微笑起来。”
他飞回康涅狄格，开始申办让她来他身边的手续。一年后我出生了，在虎年。
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在我的要求下，妈妈又用礼品包装纸给我做了一只山羊、一只小鹿和一头水牛。它们会绕着客厅跑来跑去，被老辅咆哮着追逐。当他抓住它们的时候，他会狠狠扑倒它们，直到它们肚子里的气都被挤了出来，压成了平平的纸片。我就得重新给它们吹满气，这样它们又能多跑一阵子。
有时候，这些动物也会陷入麻烦。有一次，小水牛在我们晚餐时跳进了一碟酱油里（他想戏水，跟真的水牛一样）。我飞快地把他拣了出来，但毛细效应已经使得深色的酱汁高高浸湿了他的腿。湿软的四肢撑不起他的身体，他瘫倒在桌上。我把他放在太阳下晒干，可是他的腿不再平整，自此便一瘸一拐地跑来跑去。终于，妈妈把他的腿用玻璃纸包好，这样他就可以想怎么玩水就怎么玩水了（酱油除外）。
还有，和我在后院一起玩耍的时候，老辅喜欢忽然纵身一跃扑向麻雀。可是有一次，一只走投无路的鸟儿奋起反击，啄烂了他的耳朵。妈妈用透明带粘好他的耳朵时，他在我怀中呲牙咧嘴地哀号。从此他都离鸟儿远远的。
之后一天，我在电视上看到一部讲鲨鱼的科教片，便叫妈妈也给我做一条。她折了一条小鲨鱼，但他难受地在桌面上蹦跶。我给水箱灌足水，把他放了进去。他快活地游了一圈又一圈，渐渐地沉到底，散了架。我伸手想救他，却只捞上来一片湿漉漉的纸。
老辅把前爪搭在水箱边沿，头埋进爪子里。耳朵耷拉着，喉咙里发出低沉的嘶吼，那声音令我内疚。
妈妈又给我折了一条鲨鱼，这次是用锡纸折的。这条鲨鱼在一个大金鱼缸里快活地生活。老辅和我喜欢坐在一旁看着锡纸鲨鱼追逐着鱼缸里的金鱼，老辅把脸贴在鱼缸的壁上，在另一边的我看见他的眼睛——被玻璃放大得像咖啡杯底那么大，从鱼缸对面瞪着我。
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当我十岁的时候，我们搬进了镇上另一边的新家。两个女邻居造访来表示欢迎。爸爸给她们倒上了饮料，并且为必须离家赶去水电公司以肃清前任房主的账单表示歉意。“请您自便吧，我妻子不太会说英语。所以如果她没来和您打招呼，请别怪她待客不周。”
当我在餐厅看书的时候，妈妈在厨房拾掇。邻居在客厅聊天，丝毫没有说悄悄话的意思。
“他看起来是个挺正常的男人呀，为什么会做那种事呢？”
“混血么，总是哪儿有点不对劲。那个孩子就像残品一样，窄长的亚洲人的眼睛，白种人的面孔。啧啧，小怪物。”
“你觉得他能说英语吗？”
那个女人顿了顿。一会儿，她们走进餐厅。
“乖！你叫什么名字？”
“杰克。”我说。
“这听起来并不很中国佬嘛。”
接着妈妈走进了餐厅。她对着那个女人笑了笑。三个人围着我站成一个三角形，彼此点头微笑，无话可说，直到爸爸回家。
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马克，邻居家的小孩之一，带着他的《星球大战》动作玩偶来找我玩儿。当欧比旺的光剑闪亮的时候，他还能挥舞手臂，用细细的声音说：“原力在上！”。我压根不觉得这个玩偶看起有多像真正的欧比旺。
我俩一起看着他在咖啡桌上做了五次一样的表演，然后我问道：“他还能干点别的吗？”
马克被问得恼了，“仔细看呀。”他说。
我仔细的看了看，不知道接下来该说些什么。
马克对我的反应很失望，“给我看看你的玩具呗。”他说。
除了我的纸动物们，我什么玩具也没有。我从卧室把老辅拿了出来，那时候，他已经十分陈旧，身上布满了胶水和透明胶带——多年来我和妈妈修补他留下的痕迹。他再也无法像以前那样轻灵矫健。我把他安坐在咖啡桌上，我能听见他身后跟来的其他动物们细碎匆忙的步伐，怯怯地从门廊里向客厅探视。
“小老辅，”我说，又停下，换成英语，“这是老虎。”警觉地，老辅迈步向前，轻声低唤，嗅着马克的手。
马克检视了老辅身上的包装纸的圣诞图案，道：“这压根不像老虎。你妈妈都是用垃圾给你做玩具的吗？”
我从未有过老辅是垃圾的念头，垃圾？可是看着他，他的确只是一张包装纸而已。
马克又按了一下欧比旺的头，光剑闪亮，他上下挥舞手臂：“原力在上！”
老辅转身一跃，把塑料玩偶撞下了桌子。他掉在地板上，摔裂了，欧比旺的头滚到了沙发底下。“嗷~~~”老辅笑了。我跟着笑了。
马克狠狠给了我一拳，大喊大叫：“这很贵的！现在商店里都买不着了！恐怕比你爸买你妈花的钱都多！”
我失衡摔倒在地，老辅咆哮着，朝着马克的脸扑了过去。
马克尖叫起来，害怕多于疼痛。毕竟，老辅只是纸做的老虎。
马克一把抓住老辅，老辅的怒吼戛然而止——他被马克捏坏在手，撕成两半。马克把两片纸揉成一团扔给我，“还你的又蠢又贱的中国垃圾。”
马克走了之后，我花了很久很久，屡败屡战地，试图把碎纸片粘回来，把纸张整平，顺着原来的折痕把老辅折回来。渐渐地，别的动物也进入了客厅，围拢我们——我，还有那曾经是老辅的，撕碎的纸片。
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我和马克的争斗并没有到此结束。马克在学校里是人气王。我一点儿也不愿去回想之后的两周是怎么过的。
在那两周末尾的周五，我放学回家。“学叫好吗？”妈妈问我。我一言不发的走进了浴室，我看着镜子里的自己——我一点也不像她，不像！
晚饭时我问爸爸：“我有一张中国崽的脸吗？”
爸爸放下他的筷子，即使我从未告诉他学校里发生过什么，他似乎明白状况。他闭上眼，摩挲着鼻梁，说道：“不，你没有。”
妈妈看看爸爸，一脸迷茫。她又看看我，问：“森么似中国崽？”
“英语，”我说，“说英语。”
她努力尝试着：“生发了什么？”
我把面前的碗筷远远推倒一边：青椒炒五香牛肉。“我们应该吃美国菜。”
爸爸试着讲理：“很多家庭都会不时做点中国菜吃。”
“我们不是别人。”我看着他。别人的家庭里没有一个不属于这儿的妈妈。
他的目光转向别处。接着，他一只手搭上妈妈的肩：“我会给你买本烹饪书。”
妈妈转向我：“不好次？”
“英语，”我说，声音愈来愈高，“说英语。”
妈妈伸出手，触向我的额头，感觉到我上升的体温：“发扫了？”
我挥走她的手，“我没事。说英语！”我已经在吼了。
“跟他说英语吧，”爸爸对妈妈说，“你早该料到会有这一天。你指望什么呢？”
妈妈双手垂在身侧。她坐着，从爸爸看向我，又回望爸爸。她想说点什么，却无法开口，又试着说点什么，又沉默。
“你不得不，”爸爸说，“我待你一直太宽松了。而杰克需要融入”
妈妈看了看他，“如果我说‘Love’，我的感觉在这儿，” 她指了指她的唇，“如果我说「爱」，我的感觉在这儿。”她把手扣在心口。
爸爸摇了摇头：“你在美国。”
妈妈蜷在椅子上，看起来就像那头被老辅扑倒压扁，把生气挤尽的小水牛。
“还有，我想要新玩具。”
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爸爸给我买了《星球大战》全套的动作玩偶，我把欧比旺那个给了马克。
我把纸异兽收拾进一个大大的鞋盒子里，把盒子藏到床底下。
次日早晨，这些动物纷纷逃了出来，占领了我房间里他们各自惯待的据点。我把他们统统抓住，放回鞋盒，再用胶带封紧。而这些动物吵吵嚷嚷，一刻也不肯消停，以致于我不得不把他们扔到离我房间最远的阁楼的角落。
只要妈妈用中文和我说话，我就不理她。一段时间后，她开始对我多说英语。但她糟糕的口音和的遣词造句令我窘迫。我每每试着纠正她。终于，只要我在，她便什么话也不再说了。
妈妈开始像哑语一样指东指西，当她必需要告诉我些什么的时候。她试着拥抱我，就像她在电视里看到的美国妈妈们拥抱孩子的样子。可是我觉得她的动作矫揉造作、忐忑不安、滑稽可笑而且一点也不优雅。她看到了我脸上的不耐烦，从此停止。
“你不该这么对你妈妈。”爸爸说。但他无法直视着我的眼镜说这句话。心底深处，他也一定意识到：把一个中国农民的女儿硬塞到康涅狄格的郊区是个错误。
妈妈学会了烹饪美国菜式。我开始玩电子游戏，还有学习法语。
每过一段时间，我就会看到妈妈坐在厨房的餐桌旁，全神贯注地看着一张礼品包装纸没有图案的一面。不久，一个新的折纸动物就会在我的床头柜上出现，跃跃欲试地想要抱抱我。我会一把抓住它们，挤尽它们身体里的最后一丝生气，然后把它们塞进阁楼上的鞋盒里。
当我上高中的时候，妈妈终于停止了折新的小动物。那时她的英语变好了很多，可我也已经到了她说什么我都无所谓的叛逆期，管她用什么语言呢。
有时候，当我回到家里，看到她娇小的身形在厨房里一边忙碌着，一边哼着中文歌，我实在难以相信这就是生下我的女人。我们毫无共同之处。她没准是月球上来的。我快步走回房间，继续追寻我的纯正的美国式幸福。
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爸爸和我一人立在妈妈一侧，她躺在医院的病床上。她还不到四十岁，可她看上去要比她的年纪老得多。
多年来，她都不肯为腹痛去看医生，她总是说没事、没什么的。直到有一天救护车把她送进了医院，而癌症已经病入膏肓。
我人在病房里，心却在别处。现在正是校园招聘的高峰季，我全心全意地准备着简历、档案还有按部就班规划好的面试。我算计着该怎么更好地粉饰夸口才能忽悠着面试官。我的理性告诉我：这不是你的妈妈卧病濒危时该想的事情。可是理性扭转不了我的感觉。
她还很清醒。爸爸用双手小心地捧起她的左手，低身吻了吻她的额头。他显出的苍老和虚弱忽然震惊了我。我意识到，我对爸爸的了解，几乎和我对妈妈的了解一样少。
妈妈朝他笑了笑：“我没事。”
她对爸爸低语了几句，他点点头，离开病房。
她转向我，依然笑着：“我知道你得回学校，”她的声音低弱，模糊在连着她的身体的医疗机器的嗡鸣中，“去吧。不用担心我。没什么的。好好学习。”
我伸手去握她的手，因为我似乎应该那么做。我一下子放松了，满脑子都是回程的航班，还有加州明亮的阳光。
“杰克，如果——”她猛地咳起来，好一阵子说不成话，“如果我—— 没挺过这次，千万别因为伤心坏了身子。好好过你自己的生活。只是保管好你放在阁楼上的那个盒子，每年，清明的那天，把它搬出来，想想我。我一直都会在你身边。”
清明是中国祭祀死人的节日。当我很小的时候，妈妈总是在清明那天给她死去的父母写一封信，告诉他们去年一年她在美国的幸福生活。她会大声把信念给我听，如果我评论了点什么，她会把我的话一起写在信里。然后她会把信折成一只纸鹤，朝着西方放开它。我们就一起看着，看着纸鹤扇动翅膀清脆作响，飞向太平洋，飞向中国，飞往妈妈的家乡。
上次我们一起过清明，已经是很多年前的事了。
“我完全不知道中国的日历是怎么算的，”我说，“妈，你就休息吧。”
“那就保管好那个盒子，隔段时间打开它一下。就打开一下——”她又开始咳了。
“没事的，妈。”我别扭地拍着她的背。
“伢仔，姆妈「爱」你——”她的咳嗽又占了上风。一幅陈旧发黄的画面忽然闪过我的脑海：妈妈说着「爱」这个字，把手扣在心口。
“好了，妈，别说话了。”
爸爸回到了病房，我告诉他我需要早点赶去机场，免得错过航班。
她死了，当我的飞机在涅华达某处上空的时候。
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妈妈死后，爸爸老得特别快。原来的独屋对爸爸一个人来说实在太大，他决定卖了它。我和女朋友苏珊一起去帮他收拾打扫。
苏珊在阁楼里找出了那个鞋盒子。那些纸异兽，长期深藏在不见天日的阴暗阁楼中，已经又软又脆，原来礼品包装纸上色彩斑斓的图案亦退色暗淡。
“我从没见过这样的折纸，”苏珊惊叹，“你妈妈是个了不起的艺术家。”
那些折纸动物一动不动。也许不管是什么曾驱动他们的魔法，都和妈妈一起死去了。也许他们曾经的活蹦乱跳，从头到尾只是我的幻想罢了，小孩子的记忆怎么可信呢？
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那是四月的第一个周末，妈妈过世两年后。大忙人咨询师苏珊又出差了，我待在家里，懒洋洋地换着电视频道。
我滞留在一个放着鲨鱼科教片的节目。忽然间，我的眼前浮现了妈妈的双手，巧手翻覆，折出一只小小的锡纸鲨鱼，老辅和我在一旁全神看着。
窸窣一声。我抬起头，看到一团黏着破胶带的礼品包装纸在书架脚边的地板上抖动。我走过去，想把它扔到垃圾箱里。
那团废纸倏忽撑高，自己塑出形来。我看见了老辅，原来是被我遗忘多时的老辅。“嗷~沙~” 当年我放弃他之后，一定是妈妈又把他收起来了。
他比我记忆中的要小。或者，只是当年我自己的拳头比较小吧。
苏珊把折纸动物左一处右一处地摆在公寓里，作为装饰。估计因为老辅看起来太破烂了，所以被她搁在了隐蔽的角落。
我坐在地板上，向他伸出一只手指。老辅的尾巴摇了摇，快活地蹦了过来。我哈哈笑着，摩着他的后背，老辅在我掌下轻声低唤。
“你过得怎样，老伙计？”
老辅停下了玩闹。他立起身，轻灵一跃到我的腿上，接着自行铺展开来。
现在，我的腿上是一张折旧了的包装纸，没有图案的一面朝上。纸上写遍布着密密的中文汉字。我从来也没好好学过认字，但我认识“儿子”这两个汉字。它们在最上角，那个应该是写着收信人的地方，用妈妈别扭的、孩子气的笔迹。
我走到电脑前，打开网页：今天是清明节。
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我带着那封信冲到了市中心，中国游客的大巴常驻的地方。我拦下每个游客，问着：“哩会读宗文吗？”——你会读中文吗？我太久没有说过中文，不知道对方听懂了没有。
一个年轻女子答应帮我。我们在一同在一张长椅坐下，她大声对我读出信的内容。那门多年来我一直试图遗忘的语言又回来了，一字一句，浸入我的皮肤，穿透骨髓，紧紧攥住我的心。
儿子，
我们好久没有说过话了。我害怕每当我想要碰触你时你恼火的样子。还有，我一直都有的腹痛，现在可能是个事了。
所以我决定给你写信。我会把信写在这些我给你折的纸动物里，你以前多喜欢他们呢。
当我停止呼吸的时候，这些动物也不会动了。但是如果我用全部的真心给你写信，我就能留存一点点的自我在这张纸上，在这些文字中。那么，如果你在清明节想起我，在逝者的魂灵得允回访亲人的日子，你能让这些余下的一部分的我又重新活起来。我为你折的这些造物又会再次奔跑跳跃，也许，那时你就能看见这些文字了。
因为我必须全心全意给你写信，我得用中文。
一直以来，我都没有告诉过你我的身世。当你还小的时候，我总是想，等你大一点懂事了再说吧。可是，我就再没有开口的机会了。
我1957年出生在河北的四轱辘村。你的外公外婆都来自人丁稀落的贫农家庭。我出生没几年，饿死了三千万人的大饥荒席卷中国。我最初的的记忆便是，我的母亲吃着泥巴充饥，为了能省下最后一点面粉喂给我。
之后的生活渐渐好起来，四轱辘村以它的折纸手艺而闻名，我的母亲教会了我怎么折纸动物，再让它们活起来。这是村里传承的秘法。我们折纸鸟儿驱除田地里的害虫，折纸老虎赶走屋里的耗子。在中国春节，我和朋友们一起折赤红的纸龙。我永远也不会忘记那画面：一条条小小的纸龙在头顶的空中蜷舒，抓起一串串噼啪炸响的爆竹，送走旧岁。如果你看见，也一定会喜欢的。
然后，1966年，文革来了。邻里反目，兄弟阋墙。有人想起了我的舅舅，他1946年去了香港，在那儿经商定居。有个在香港的亲戚就意味着我们是间谍、是人民的敌人，我们只能在夹缝中求生。你苦命的外婆——她无法忍受种种凌虐，跳井了。接着有一天，一群带着土猎熗的小伙子把你外公拽进一片小树林，他再也没有回来。
剩下我，一个10岁的孤儿。我仅存的亲人只有在香港的舅舅。一天夜里，我逃走了，搭上了一趟南下的货运火车。
数日后的广东，几个男人逮住了正在偷东西吃的我。听说我想去香港的时候，他们大笑： “今天是你的吉日，我们做的就是带女仔去香港的生意。”
他们把我和别的小女孩一起藏在一辆卡车底部，带我们偷渡过境。
我们被带到一处地下室，按他们说的站直、打起精神，好讨买家欢心。光顾的家庭付给仓库一笔钱，过来打量挑选出我们中的一个“领养”。
秦家选中了我来照看家里的两个男孩。我每天早晨4点起床准备早餐，给两个少爷喂饭洗澡，还有买菜，洗衣，拖地。我跟着他们，唯命是从。晚上我被锁在厨房的碗柜里睡觉。动作慢了或者做错事了我会挨打，少爷做错事了我会挨打，如果他们抓住我试图学点英文，我也会挨打。
“你为什么想学英文？”秦先生问我，“你想去警察局吗？我们会跟警察举报你这个非法居留的大陆妹。他们会很乐意把你关进监狱里的。”
整整六年，我都是这样过的。有一天，一个早市卖鱼的老妇悄悄把我拉到一边。
“我见过不少像你这样的女孩子。你多大了，十六？有一天，你的男主人会喝多，然后他会盯着你，再一把拉住你……你没法反抗，直到有一天被你的女主人发觉，那时候，你才知道什么叫人间地狱。你得摆脱那种人生。我认识人能帮你。”
她给我讲了许多想讨个亚洲老婆的美国男人的故事。只要我能烧饭，打扫，照顾我的美国丈夫，他就能给我个好日子过。那是我当时唯一的希望。这就是我怎么登上那本满是假话的目录，遇到你爸爸的经过。这不是一个浪漫的故事，但，这就是我的故事。
在康涅狄格的郊区，我很孤独。你爸爸对我温柔又诚挚，我很感激他。但是没人懂我，我也什么都不懂。
然后你出生了！当我看到你的脸，看见我的父亲、母亲、还有我自己的影子，我是多么的幸福。我失去了整个家，四轱辘的所有，我曾经熟悉过、爱过的一切。可是，我有了你，你的脸就是证明，它如此真实。这不是梦。
现在我有了说话的人。我会教你我的语言，我能和你一起，一点点的拼凑起我曾经深爱过又失去了的一切。当你第一次开口说话，用中文，用我和我的母亲一样的口音，我哭了好久好久。当我给你做好第一只折纸动物，你破涕为笑的那一刻，仿佛全世界的忧虑都一扫而空。
你又长大了一点，现在甚至都能当爸爸和我之间的小翻译了。我才真正有了家的感觉。我终于过上了好日子。我多希望我的父母也在这儿，我能给他们烧饭端菜，让他们也过上好日子。可我的父母早已不在了。你知道中国人心中最为悲哀的事是什么？树欲静而风不止，子欲养而亲不待。
儿子，我知道你不喜欢你的中国眼睛，那是我的眼睛。我知道你不喜欢你的中国头发，那是我的头发。可是你知道吗，仅仅是你的存在本身，就带给了我数不尽的喜悦？你又能否明白，当你不再和我说话，也不准我和你说中文的时候，我是什么感觉？我觉得，我再次失去了一切。
儿子，为什么你不肯和我说话？我痛得写不下去了。
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年轻女子把那张纸交还给我，我不敢面对她的眼神。
低着头，我请求她帮忙把妈妈信中的「爱」都划出来。我反复在那张纸上描着这个字，用笔触抚摩她的字迹，一遍又一遍。
年轻女子伸出手，拍拍我的肩。然后她起身离去，剩下我一个人，和妈妈的思念。
顺着折痕，我把那张纸折回成老辅。我把他兜在怀中，他轻声低唤着，同我一起回家去。
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