spring 2010
Liang Yao, “Good Medicine”; also, sometimes, “effective medicine” by Pam Zhang In my house, the cabinet over the bathroom sink is almost bare. Dental floss, Q-tips, plastic giraffe cup. Mismatched bandaids (large, small, Hello Kitty) and rubber bands. Three sealed toothbrushes. One tube of genericbrand Neosporin. Candle stubs. In the frantic search for a remedy to cure that churning stomach, scraped elbow, or banged knee, don’t look to where a lifetime of personal experiences and modern movies have led you to expect. Glance down. Crouch on knees or wobbly heels. Open the cabinet below the sink and peer into a cavernous space trailing pipes and useless Christmas lights. Push aside the extra shampoo bottles, the dented ornaments, the lopsided (lying) scale. Go deeper; stick your torso in. Breathe in the pipe-rust, water-must mingling of stagnancy and a sharp something that bites deep back in the nose, pinches the sinuses. Sneeze if you must, but no point backing out now; the bitter medicinal tang will cling to your clothes despite multiple washings and when you least expect, the odor will rise unsolicited from sleeve or collar and surrounding noses will wrinkle. So take the plunge. Follow your nose to the cardboard box pushed deep in the back. Examine its frayed edges, self-important stamps, indecipherable foreign scrawl. And if you’re hoping to encounter Advil, Tylenol, Tums, and adhesive gauze at the end of this quest, sorry to disappoint. These contents defy simple, one-word brand names. Sometimes, they even defy the attempts of the English language to alphabetize, categorize, organize. They are:
prominence with family photos and favorite books. The day it lost its favored spot was also the day we moved, the day I left my kindergarten-through-third best friends behind, the day I stopped running, biking, climbing, fighting for a long while. And somewhere in the interim, I lost my nerve. Cringed rather than welcomed the trade of scraped skin for the heady rush of a plunge down a sharp incline. So the iodine bottle went into storage, meeting its expiration date in the dark and dust.
Ke sou yao
“cough medicine” I am eleven and trying to slither out of school for a day. Not that I’m faking sick, exactly. I woke up with a throat too sore to swallow and some unfinished homework, so I rasp in a theatrical whisper that’s just a little exaggerated: Mom I don’t think I can go to school today. My mom, though short, is still taller than my prepubescent self. A few extra inches of perspective give her the uncomfortable air of looming over and peering into me through her glasses as she feels my forehead. She drops her hand immediately and frowns, the message clear: no fever, no skipping. That’s the unspoken ironclad rule of my family. Shivers, cough, chills, aches, headaches, sore throats aside, if you’re not fa shao, literally burning with heat, then you go about your day as usual. Despite this knowledge, I persevere. It really hurts, I insist in my continued stage whisper, pausing for effect to prove that even the most minute vibrations of my vocal cords cause excruciating pain. She refuses to meet my eyes as I trail pathetically behind her. I think I have her; she’s wavering, turning, and most reluctantly reaching a hand into the box knotted with packaging tape. Take these, she says, shaking two unmarked white pills into my palm. I look at her with gratitude and a tinge of awe. We don’t dispense medicines casually around here. The action of reaching into our precious stash of China-sent remedies means much more than the sum of its physical parts. I shut up and take the pills with no further complaints. Minutes later, my sore throat disappears as if by magic. And go to school, she reminds me for good measure.
Dian jiu
“tincture of iodine” I am four-five-six and I know that iodine comes out of a dark brown bottle. Not until seven-eight, when curiosity and familiarity finally overcome the gut-twisting fear of impending pain that the little bottle evokes in my father’s hand, do I learn that iodine itself isn’t brown. It’s yellow, a beautiful, deep, earthy yellow. It takes years to learn this simple fact because I’m used to seeing iodine stained purple-brown against my skin, its true colors swirled with and dirtied by the bloody messes over which my father applies it. Iodine, yellow-brown, astringent, accompanied by cotton swabs and sharp reprimands and gentle hands, is irrevocably intertwined with my childhood: bike rides (and bike crashes), tree climbs (and branch gashes), exploring expeditions, summer camps, fights, plays, picnics, tag games, make believe. The iodine bottle always sat within easy reach those days, sharing center-shelf
Xue li hong
“Chinese mustard greens” I am fourteen and feel like I’ve been stuffed up forever. A combination of allergies and the tail end of a seasonal
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