The Yale Literary Magazine, Fall 2016

29 after finishing the first layer, you’d stitch again with a different color, so that the pale and dark colors would blend together naturally. This was different from the technique of plain stitches that Mrs. Zhao’s generation used, which only had one layer and left the boundary between dark and pale colors very sharp and obvious.

Little Ying was like a scholar’s attendant, and also like a chief advisor: “Draw a pomegranate flower!” “Draw a gardenia!” As long as she could pick up the flower, he could copy it onto the paper. Later, whether it was rose balsam, carnation, water pepper, bamboo, nandina or wintersweet flower, he could draw them all. Mrs. Zhao also liked those drawings.

She hugged Ming Hai’s monk head: “You are so smart! Why don’t you be my godson?” Little Ying held his shoulders and said: “Quick, quick, call godmother!” Little Ming made a bow to Ying’s mother and started calling her godmother from then on.

People in the whole area, including those living as far as ten miles away, heard about the three pairs of embroidered shoes that big Ying had made. Many girls walked or took a boat to come see the shoes. After taking a look, they would say: “They’re so pretty! How is this embroidered? This is a real flower!” They would bring sheets of paper and beg aunt Zhao to ask the little monk to come and draw them something.

Some people asked for patterns on hanging curtains, some for those on door ribbons for decoration; others wanted floral prints on shoes.

Every time Ming came to draw flowers, little Ying would make him something tasty. She would cook two boiled eggs, steam a bowl of taro, and fry some lotus cakes. Because