Three International Idioms Reimagined as Fiction, 3 by Meredith Wadley
I. Not in Front What Is Behind (Texasdeutsch: Nicht vorne wie hinten sein)
In 1870, Oskar became the census taker because he could sit a horse, write his name, and appreciate a warm body. Arriving unannounced at homesteads, he’d face down vicious dogs and shout out his authority, hoping someone might appear and be approachable. He faced down more shotguns than dogs. Anyone strong enough to lift one could aim one; a four-year-old with a rifle blew off his derby.
Mostly, he’d count country folk from a distance, guessing their ages and sex. A genial neighbour widows mostly—often helped with any details, even making the Xs of a falsified signature, no one the wiser.
White, Black, Mulatto, Indian, and one Chinese. Phillis, Leopold, Betty, Pierre, and May. Six-days-old to ninety-nine years. One poor fella sat mummified in his rocking chair on his porch. Hadn’t had visitors for a spell, Oskar reckoned.
A local pastor, with a crab infested beard and a leg lost to the War Between the States, joined Oskar. He sat astride a mule that irritated Oskar’s dainty Missouri-bred mare, but his presence and worn Bible opened many doors.
At one house, a poor child took her last diphtherial breath before the pastor had finished his prayer for her recovery and Oskar had finished writing Grace. As visible as self-deceit, the men carried the child’s disease to each new place, leaving behind a plague they had not found upon arrival and from which, at each gravesite, they later profited.
II. Single Grass, Single Dewdrop (Chinese: 一枝草，一點露)
Amà sent Mei-Mei into the garden with an eyedropper every morning to collect dewdrops for the family’s potted grass. Sometimes, Mei-Mei went out dressed in her lavender silk pyjamas. Other times, she went in her school uniform—white shirt, navy skirt, and white socks. Gardener Lee often called from his shed under the cedar trees to give her a sticky-rice sweet. Lee never removed the mackintosh he’d inherited from Agōng.
During the war years, Amà and Agōng’s families fled China, carrying the potted grasses and precious jade buddhas, dragons, temple dogs, and bowls carved so thin they glowed. A teak cabinet held rings, bracelets, and necklaces to be passed down to Mei-Mei. Auspicious watering was to safeguard these fortunes for Mei-Mei.
During the dry season, dew hardly filled the eyedropper. Rainy season was worse! Lee had shown her the difference between rainwater and dew-water, yet Mei-Mei struggled to keep them straight until he led her a shielded bed of lady’s mantle. Nothing collected dew better than lady’s mantle!
One day, a typhoon threatened Taiwan’s shores, cancelling school. Lee reinforced their windows with Xs of tape, and Amà filled the bathtubs, sinks, and buckets with water. Rain lashed the bungalow, rattled its tiles. Gusts thrashed the garden foliage, snapping off branches, yet Mei-Mei could not forego her duty. “Each potted grass grows as thirsty one day as the next,” Amà said. “Life never stops needing care, not for war, disease, or storms.”
III. To Get There by Four Paths (French: Y aller par quatre chemins)
You warned me, said I’d detest being alone with my work. I wouldn’t be strictly alone, I said, unless I locked myself in my room. But, yes, I soon stalled, unhappy with place, situation, and those around me—the sculptors, poets, and musicians.
I sent you photos: my desk against fifteenth-century stone walls, my balcony’s view of ornamental herb beds, sunbathers by the pool, vineyards, olive orchards, and the medieval towers of distant hilltop towns. I recorded the sound of bells ringing but couldn’t record the slowing of my heartbeat.
Daily shots of espresso hit my throat hot and bitter. Someone below my balcony smoked a sunrise joint. Someone next door phoned home at noon. Someone played with kittens. Someone admired the full moon. A pair kissed.
Cicadas chorused in the day, katydids at night. A midnight dog barked. Laughter and the slosh of water: Two women in the pool, their naked figures silhouetted by turquoise water lit from below.
Evenings, I’d curl on a leather sofa, dip bread in garlic-rubbed olive oil, and pluck cheeses from a tray. Firelight flickered across book-lined walls. The hostess made us iced Campari, limoncello, and Sambuca con la mosca—cheers to your health, happiness, and any necessary idleness!
At a great and ancient table, we toasted, our wine glasses delicate, the sweet wine unfolding almond, cherry, and chocolate secrets. I nibbled antipasto, twirled my pasta, and savoured mouthfuls of dolce, gelato, panna cotta, and torta della nonna. Espresso and grappa followed. My companions’ disparate accents—Chinese, Ghanaian, Peruvian, and Texan—confused me, and I shrank from exchanges, engagement, and even eavesdropping. No, I did not join the evening of local music and dance.
Yes, you warned me, but you know me only half-well, which comes with its own problems. It’s the perfection of being settled that stalls me. Had my room looked out upon a narrow, cobbled, and highly foot-trafficked street, I’d have longed for farmland vistas, goat bells, and woodsmoke. Had it viewed ships at sea, I’d have longed for Bedouin tents. Had the air been as thin as La Rinconada’s, I’d have longed for a thick breath of Baku.
At the village bus stop, I waited with my bags. The bus curbed at the train station. The railway lines sang all the way to the ferry docks. Leaning over the ferry’s windward rail, I watched dolphins leading me to a volcano cradled by the sea. Its crevices didn’t erupt, but mine did—I mused, journaled, and edited.
Listen: I sat, moved, walking, running, pedalling, swimming. I climbed, humming, whistling, and singing. I supped and drank. I chatted. Latitudes east and west, I slept. Longitudes north and south, I woke. A new continent. Hemisphere. Darling, every new destination weakens and strengthens me—I’d lock myself into a craft bound for space if I could. Am I coming home? Someday, I may get there by four paths.
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Meredith Wadley lives and works in a small medieval town on the Swiss side of the Rhine River, where the bridge to Germany is currently blockaded and the skies are free of vapour trails. Her most recent fiction is published or forthcoming in Bartleby Snopes, upstreet thirteen, Collateral, Gone Lawn, JMWW, Lammergeier, and Orca Lit.