Opening the door, they appeared only slightly, her father favouring being waited on, always slow; her mother anticipating that same delay (that anticipation lately a second nature) likewise took her time; both of them egging each other and commenting on how slow the other was but nonetheless concentrating on not being the first out of the door, and constantly calibrating and measuring how much lack of progress the other has since made. But with one inevitable motion after another, they emerged. To anyone who saw them , it was as her parents' bones were too fragile to bear that leaded weight, to anyone who heard her parents' urging each other to come along, to anyone who saw her father's half limp or noticed the deliberation before and how her mother winced and painfully shut the door; her father and mother were weak and needed very much her assistance. To anyone, but to her. To her, who was waiting for them in her car, they were the most irritating people in the world. She deliberated momentarily on whether to get down to assist them, and being unsure whether that would speed things up or only slow things down, she instead closed her eyes and crossed her hands, and leaned back into the seat.
Lihong had seriously considered the personality of her parents, and her understanding and belief was that they were archetypal of right wing authoritarians. Her initial horror of the discovery of how this type was commonplace among the upper middle classes had faded into a general resignation and recognition that it was evident that an ability to hold simultaneously contradictory views or draw illogical inferences from facts together with the desire to compete and destroy one's competitors while cravenly respecting and agreeing with one's superiors (or those they desire to please while ignoring the truth) were the most important factors to ensure personal success in this country. Her parents' instinctive anger towards those who are different or perceived to be the subject of condemnation by the state (gays, Marxists, foreigners) makes for little happiness in their lives; her parents' self imposed ritual of waking up daily at 5am to contemplate God together with the required three weekly church visitations tried her very patience; the thousand and one other rules and rituals her Mother thought of but cannot do without; and to Lihong's greatest anxiety, her parents frequent need to always tell someone they know someone else more important.
Lihong recognised however, right wing authoritarians, however unhappy, had one amazing advantage in life, and which probably ensured their very survival. They somehow are able to survive any regime, any abuse, any misfortune, no matter how cruel; and especially when the regime is cruel, because of their ability to sacrifice for their superiors while simultaneously disliking (or actively abusing) their subordinates (or the vulnerable), and willingness to forsake the truth for respectability. For those reasons, she knew they too thrive in certain occupations. Lihong was lucky, a couple of years into her childhood, she had decided to pretend to be one of them. Lihong smiled and fawned and memorise and spoke her lines so she lived in relative peace. Not until she met him, of course; but she knew him well, so she should have known better.
Its easy now to see how Lihong would not even have had fallen mildly in love with him if she had take took some years to develop a sense of authenticity, some experience with a different, less wild, kind of men; those experiences would have shot down some of that romantic identity that she knew many women in her generation secretly habours, which is entirely contrary to what they say -'"I like being alone", "I don't mind." "I can stay with this or that unattached friend."' And the best way to soothe that need for intimacy - her obvious choice was to date the free-est hottest guy she knew. But perhaps more importantly, even as she was sick and tired and entirely floundering at her job by (having excelled for the last three years) deep down she was still enthralled with having it all - love, beauty, and professional success; it was precisely his total lack of ambition and perhaps most importantly, his entire embrace of his vision of her (absolutely without any reservation) as a "hot successful professional female", that was all she needed now.
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