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Like other disputes, it just had to happen on the dinner table. Alice’s half-finished milkfish pasta sat silently on the table as her mother roared. There were many things she wanted to yell back at her. Have you realized I’ve grown up and can make my own judgment? Have you realized how far away we’ve grown apart? Her father started to speak in an awkward, soft voice, which strengthened like the rain in summer turns into a storm. Their food laid abandoned on the table, white rice for her mother, basil source for her elder brother, and milkfish stomach for her father. Alice was still hungry. She just didn’t have an idea of what she could eat to starve that hunger. Was there anything that would work?
“It’s not a phase.” She cut in her mother’s sentence, looking at her, looking into her. “It’s not. Stop hoping that I’ll change into what you want of me.”
She stood up, grabbed her coat and keys and phone (with student card) and walked briskly out. She didn’t run. She was sure of that.
Her brother was the one who remembered the helmets.
The siblings didn’t exchange a word while fastening their helmets. Alice did the work with a shaking hand. Her brother’s forefinger touched her chin as a silent question. Do you need help? She shook her head. November never felt cold in Kaohsiung. She didn’t understand the sheen of sweat on her neck. It wasn’t a time for understanding anyway. By the time her mother had started screaming, she’s steady on the scooter, her brother holding her waist. The speed climbed over 40 km/hr, and all she could hear was the wind.
They rode out of the small apartment-cramming district. She had only two things on her mind when night turned asphalt into unspeakable darkness so they were like riding in the ether: found the river, found the light. Engine’s stable rumbling kept her mind blank. Overly blank.
She wondered whether she was dissolving.
She turned another corner, and the light of the city splashed on them. This was where the noise would invade. High school students chatting with their friends on street still wearing uniforms, blue-collar workers sharing a meal in diners along the streets, and families that didn’t want to cook squeezed in their favorite diners. Their laughter and vivid gestures built like a wall. Alice cut through it. She only knew how to cut through things, dissect them, analyze them. That’s how she learned in school, tearing the text apart word by word. When she was free she pictured the six codes she had to memorize like pomegranates, the phrases and sentences arils, staining her hands red. There’s no room left for imagination when she’s busy. That’s why she shared this image with her brother so late—she had forgotten herself. Her brother, the artistic kid long abandoned by the educational system of Taiwan, agreed to the metaphor while emphasizing how he had hated law more because of that. Her elder brother resented pomegranates, unlike her.
She pressed the brake, and slowly stopped for the red light. Another dusty silver 125 c.c stopped next to her. A second later, a black motorcycle came to her other side, a step too close to the white line. A gigantic, monstrous thing. The surface was carefully polished. She found her hands sweating as if facing a mountain she couldn’t climb. It’s nothing but a fucking machine, why am I scared of it? She furiously fixed her eyes on the road ahead. That, though, didn’t stop her breath quickening.
Her brother lifted his face shield. “Cocky bastard”.
That made her bark. Then she realized that, on all the way they rode here, her brother didn’t make a sound. She didn’t even notice her brother breathing. She felt ashamed of that.
“Fuck yes.” Was the only thing she managed before the light turned green.
This time, when the evening air engulfed her, she didn’t lose herself in it.
They rode onto the quieter section of the road. Still broad enough for a serious car crash that involves at least one BMW. The lamplight feels less murky. A sharper kind of white. Sounds of talking brushed through them like whispers. Alice could see the river now. “Love River”, it was named. A few decades ago this was the classic demonstration of industrial pollution, filled with trash of all kinds. Now it was just another stream flowing down into the Taiwan Strait. To her, the noise dissolved into the river and was washed away alone with neon light.
She stopped the scooter next to a lamp half her height. “Get down now, big brother.”
She watched him taking his steps. Her brother had sharp cheekbones, dark hair, obsidian eyes too large to be Asian, traits that were not expected from a Taiwanese. Her brother had started college by the time she entered senior high school. On the rare occasion that he did go home and hung out with her, riding to department stores far enough from home or school, quizzical and jealous looks fried her like a boiling pot, under the misconception that her brother was her “handsome European boyfriend”. It was kind of horrible, at the same time way too hilarious. Really, the only physical feature Alice shared with her brother was her dark hair, and it was hard to tell if it was a trait taken after their father or more of a thing from her Taiwanese mother’s side. Their father once mentioned that her brother’s cheekbone took after Maria. That’s the only time their father brought up the topic of his late Italian wife in front of Alice’s mother.
Her brother pulled the cap of his black hoodie on. “I should have been more mature than that.”
“Huh. Where does that come from?”
He sighed, defeatedly. “I should have not cared. Not because she’s your mom or whatever. Because she’s a parent, an elder relative.”
“So do I. See how riled up I was.” Alice joined her brother leaning on the railings. This was a newly renovated region, where paints didn’t peel off if one traced their nails through the surface. In the dark, the paint looked orange rather than white.
“You have the privilege.”
She almost chuckled. “Because she’s my mom?”
“No.” Her brother’s face was painted weirdly pale by street light. Shallow. “Because you’re still in school. You’re studying law.”
You know better than me if the worst comes. You are forgiven for your status as a student and respected as a future lawyer. That was what left unsaid.
She stared at the rippling water. Chewing her words. “Sometimes I’m afraid of my protection you know. Afraid of the privilege I own.”
Her brother laughed, bent over the edge. Her gaze fell on his wayward hair, blocking his eyes from her. He spoke nothing.
“How’s Will?”
Her brother took his time to answer. “Last time I heard he’s not in jail.”
“Great. Your future plan?”
“He’s—I think I should count myself lucky,” Her brother was deliberately biting his lower lip. “He does not urge himself to involve in the movement to the point of getting himself arrested. I’m sad he put the change he could make in Hong Kong before us but—who am I to judge him?” He bit again. “Also, his grandmother. She’s very old. Just like what he said ‘there comes an age for trees when you cannot replant them without harming the roots.’ I don’t like it. But, well. Damn those arrogant police officers. I don’t like it.” He was watching the dark purple sky above, blinking his eyes rapidly. “Hey, do you think there also comes an age for people to stop caring about justice? So absorbed in their responsibility that they don’t even look?”
She followed her brother’s gaze up, up. Like any other city, the stars were a scarcity. Heavy cloud obscured the moon, leaving a shadowy light ball hanging above. Echo ran in her head. The word she was so afraid that her mother would say, she said it first instead. Phase.
Did most people believe that the pursuit of justice was just a phase? A fantasy to dream in youth, threw away once had a decent job? She knew some of the elder people believed to act for public welfare was an absurd thing. They called those who struck or demonstrated on streets brainwashed. They believed the government would sort everything out, and as subjects, the only thing they needed to do was to wait. They had been the ones who survived—or even thrived—in the martial law era. They felt protected then, without all the news showcasing the unresolved darkness of the society.
Alice knew that, if those people were born in Nazi Germany, they would have been the ones who safely lived through the war. They would have been the ones who lived just next to a concentration camp, smelt the smoke, heard the gunshot, and never thought to take a glance closer.
She had no doubt that she and her brother would have been the ones sent inside.
The past few months had been tiring. She had started following the news of Hong Kong back in June when she was busy preparing for more exams and report as a junior of law major. The situation seemed serious. People talked about possible peaceful demonstrations of larger scale. They talked about tear gas. Time moved passed July. People started talking about armed attacks. They started talking about the blocked metro station. They talked about sexual assault inside the police station.
Just last week, a 15-year girl on the swimming team had been found dead, in the sea. The police deemed it a suicide and refused further investigation. Anger nearly choked her as she read, and read on. Edited footage. Hired actress as the girl’s mother in police held interview. Too many unusual signs. Too many made up excuses. The girl might not have died as a direct impact of the demonstration, but her family had been denied the truth because of the demonstration.
I don’t understand. Her mother had said at the dinner table. If they have so much time on their hands, why don’t they do something more productive?
Are you suggesting that the protestors are stupid? Her brother countered.
There was nothing more important than supporting yourself and your family. Was her mother’s answer. Indignance never translates into money. The violence and chaos are destroying the city. You should be the one who understand, making money of your own.
She remembered watching her mother spoke. She remembered watching her mother spoke while she chewed. She remembered the urge to spit the food inside her mouth out. She remembered the question she dared not ask: Will you say that if I’m the one who is mysteriously dead?
Next to her, her brother was clutching the railings tightly as if to anchor himself. She couldn’t remember if he was just as insecure the day he had arrived at this island. A ten-year-old child, afraid of this damp and hot weather. Frightened of the future. She was only seven herself. They could barely understand each other. Many fights between the siblings ended in screams from all four members of the family. It’s a miracle how they learned to accept each other, to watch each other’s back. It’s a gift how her brother turned out to be the one who shared the most similarities with her, despite their different skin tone and mother tongue.
Her brother’s question rang in her ears. Do you think people abandoned social justice when they grew older?
“No. At least I won’t.” She swallowed her feelings threatening to escape as incomprehensible words.
Her brother made a face. “This is a fucking heteronormative world and I’m the worst boyfriend. Will deserves better.”
“Nonsense. We both know you’re a very considerate boyfriend. Not everyone joins protests in the streets with their partner. Some will walk out of the relationship because of it.” Could she possibly smack sense into her brother’s head? Sometimes her brother’s self-esteem issue was really annoying.
“You know how we met.” Her brother grumbled. He straightened up a little. “And you? Your—your ex-boyfriend?” He spoke cautiously, gentle as touching scales on a butterfly’s wing.
“Oh.” She blushed. “We, well, we’re still good. We didn’t break up. I didn’t specify the time tense on the dinner table, did I? When I talked about ‘I have a girlfriend’ I was thinking back in senior high school.” She bowed her head. “And anyway, I have my points delivered.”
Her brother fell silent again. “I’m sorry I just let you blow your closet up in front of mom.”
Something too warm to be annoyance rose in her. “Stop beating yourself up, my dear big brother. After all, I’m the one who led you down the path of drawing gay romance comic and unfortunately kicked start the whole conversation today.”
“You know those two are absolutely unrelated.” The corner of her brother’s mouth twitched, almost a grin. She smiled.
“Not in the full picture. In today’s sense? Yes.”
She stretched herself up like a bamboo. Her brother watched her, amusement dancing in his eyes. “I took this to be some post-mid-term symptom?”
“Shut up. I still have reports to finish.”
“Bless you. Hope your professor gets hit by a car and has to postpone the deadline.” He said dryly.
That made her laugh.
Alice walked back to their scooter. She picked up her helmet, weighing it. Then she picked up her brother’s helmet and made a move to throw it. Her brother rushed to take the helmet out of her hands, a mildly horrified look fixed on his face.
She nudged him on the back, black fabric warm and soft. “Your turn to ride. Pick a rode you like.”