| Thandeka |
I arrived in China with a suitcase that smelled like home and a head full of rules.
Rules had always made sense to me. Wake early. Study hard. Speak when spoken to. Do not look at men in the eye for too long. Do not want things that were not meant for you. Obedience, I'd been taught, was not weakness—it was survival dressed in good manners.
Be a good girl and the world will open its doors.
That was what my mother said at the airport in Johannesburg, her hands gripping mine like she could still pull me back if she tried hard enough. "You're going far, Thandeka," she said. "Remember who you are."
I nodded. I always nodded.
Now, standing beneath a grey Beijing sky that smelled of rain and metal, I repeated her words to myself like a prayer. Remember who you are. A scholarship student. A daughter who did not disappoint. A woman whose body was hers but whose future belonged to discipline.
The university gates rose before me—wide, imposing, carved with characters I could not yet read. Inside them waited my Master's program in International Business, the dormitory, a life carefully planned and painfully earned.
What I did not know then was that rules only hold until power enters the room.
The first time I saw Fu Jincheng, he was not looking at me.
He stood on a small stage in the main auditorium, hands folded behind his back, posture effortless in a dark tailored suit. The new university head administrator, they said. Not a professor, not a dean—something higher, vaguer, heavier. The kind of man whose decisions traveled through hallways long after he had left them.
His Mandarin flowed smoothly, measured and calm. The translator beside him struggled to keep up.
"Discipline," the translator said in English, "is not restriction. It is direction."
I wrote the sentence in my notebook without thinking. Discipline is direction. It felt familiar. Safe.
Then his eyes lifted.
They passed over rows of faces—Chinese students, international students, tired faculty—until they paused. On me.
I felt it physically, like a finger pressing gently into my chest.
His gaze did not linger long. It didn't need to. Something had already shifted, like furniture quietly rearranged in a dark room.
Later, my roommate Lindiwe laughed when I mentioned him.
"You noticed him too?" she teased, kicking off her shoes. "Girl, he's married. Rich. Untouchable. Probably doesn't even know we exist."
I smiled and agreed. I always agreed.
But that night, I dreamed of corridors with no doors and a man whose voice followed me even when I turned away.
China was louder than I expected and lonelier than I had prepared for.
The campus buzzed with electric scooters and fast footsteps, conversations spilling in languages I half-understood. I learned how to bow slightly when greeting professors, how to accept business cards with both hands, how to disappear politely when I felt overwhelmed.
I was good at disappearing.
Weeks passed. My days were filled with lectures, group projects, library hours that stretched until my eyes burned.
At night, I called home when I could afford the data and told my mother everything was fine.
It mostly was.
Until the email arrived.
Subject: Office Consultation – International Students
From: Office of Administration (Fu Jincheng)
I read it three times, my heart tapping too quickly against my ribs.
It was formal. Polite. I had been selected, along with a few others, for a one-on-one consultation regarding international student support and leadership development.
Leadership. The word felt too big for my mouth.
"You better go," Lindiwe said when I showed her. "That's how opportunities start."
Opportunities.
I pressed my blouse the next morning, choosing the plainest one I owned. I tied my hair back neatly. Obedience, after all, had a uniform.
His office was on the top floor of the administrative building, glass walls overlooking the campus like a private sky. When I knocked, a calm voice told me to enter.
Fu Jincheng stood by the window, hands behind his back, the city stretching endlessly beyond him.
"Thandeka," he said, pronouncing my name carefully, respectfully. "Please sit."
I sat.
Up close, he smelled faintly of tea and something expensive I couldn't name. His face was composed, handsome in a way that did not ask for approval. There was a gold band on his left hand.
He asked about my studies. My home country. My ambitions.
No one had ever asked me about my ambitions before like they were real things, not childish wishes to be trimmed down.
"You are very disciplined," he said after I answered carefully, cautiously. "But discipline without reward leads to bitterness."
I didn't know what to say, so I stayed silent.
"There are ways," he continued, voice smooth, "to ease a student's path. Scholarships extended. Connections made. Comfort provided. Especially for someone so far from home."
I nodded.
When I left his office, my legs felt unsteady, as though the floor had tilted slightly while I wasn't looking.
The help began subtly.
An unexpected stipend adjustment. Access to networking events meant for doctoral candidates. Invitations that arrived directly, bypassing the usual bureaucracy.
"You're lucky," people said.
I told myself that was all it was. Luck. Merit. Favor earned through obedience.
But favors, I learned, are never free.
Our meetings became more frequent. Always professional. Always behind closed doors. He never touched me. Never raised his voice. Never crossed a line that could be named.
That was the most dangerous part.
He spoke about his family once, casually, like one might mention the weather.
"My wife is traditional," he said, sipping tea. "She values stability. Our eldest son is abroad, managing one of our companies. The younger ones are still in school."
I pictured them without meaning to.
A woman somewhere, arranging a home that did not include me. Children who called him Baba.
"You remind me of myself," he said, looking at me over the rim of his cup. "When I was young. Hungry. Careful."
Hungry? Is that the right word?
The word settled inside me and refused to leave.
I began to notice changes in myself before I admitted them.
I started choosing dresses instead of blouses. Lipstick instead of lip balm. I told myself it was confidence. Growth. Exposure to a new culture.
When he complimented me—never my body, always my "presence," my "intelligence"—I felt something warm and shameful bloom in my chest.
He never asked.
He suggested.
A better apartment closer to campus. "The dorms can be restrictive," he said gently.
A private Mandarin tutor. "Language is power."
A phone that did not lag when I called home. "You shouldn't struggle."
Each gift came wrapped in concern. Each acceptance loosened something inside me.
I told myself I was still the same girl. Obedient. Grateful. In control.
But obedience, I was learning, can be redirected.
The night everything tilted, it was raining.
He invited me to dinner under the pretense of discussing a conference opportunity. I almost refused. I said "almost."
The restaurant was quiet, elegant, hidden above street level. Candles reflected in dark wood and glass. No students. No staff. Just us.
"You've changed," he said as we ate. Not accusing. Observing.
"So has my life," I replied before I could stop myself.
He smiled at that. Not kindly. Not cruelly. Knowingly.
"Desire," he said softly, "is not dirt, Thandeka. It becomes dirty only when we lie to ourselves about it."
My fork paused halfway to my mouth.
For the first time since I arrived in China, I did not nod.
I looked at him.
And in that moment, I understood something that frightened me more than any rule I had ever broken: I was no longer asking how to remain obedient.
I was wondering what it would cost to stop being good.
As the rain streaked the windows and the city hummed below us, I felt the first crack form in the girl my mother had raised.
And through that crack, something darker—and more awake—began to breathe.