China's Son (19 page)

There was disappointment in their eyes.

Sen was a man of reason. “Well, we're all grown up now. If you gotta do it, then go do it. Let's have a drink tonight, though.”

“I'll be here with all the food you can eat. You guys go make big money, and we'll celebrate tonight.”

“You better be hitting the books or else I'll crack your skull,” Mo Gong threatened affectionately. He would have made a great law enforcement officer.

Yi and Siang both kicked my behind as I left them.

On my way home, I thought about them and the money. Things used to be simpler. There had been no college to dream about, and my friends had just been lightweight neighborhood hooligans, walking their beat on the street of
Yellow Stone. A puff of smoke could make them content, and a good joke could last for days. Tobacco had been sweet and liquor charming. Now I was turning down their offer of adventure to hit my tedious books, while they headed out on a mission to clean out the whole town. The thought wedged in the middle of my heart. I sighed as I entered our house and crept into my room, where my books were waiting patiently for me. I closed my eyes before opening the first book to study the first item on the agenda for the day.

There was peace within me. The excitement of the new year belonged out there, on the street of Yellow Stone.

Dad had brewed a tall pot of strong tea. He sat comfortably in his old cane chair with his feet on a stool. The wellwishers of the New Year had gone home. It was quiet family time. My brother sat in the corner lighting a cigarette while Dad poured a cup of steaming tea for him and filled another for me.

“It's New Year's Day and we have made a new decision about your brother,” Dad said to me. “He is going to take time off and start preparing for the college exam. What do you think?” Dad sounded confident. Once he had made a decision, he considered that eighty percent of the job was done. He had faith that if he believed in us, we could swim the ocean and climb mountains. No hurdle was too high to leap, no glory too lofty to obtain.

I looked at my brother, who was smoking quietly, then at my dad.

“Dad, why didn't I hear about it sooner? I'll go make room for him in my study; I know I'll learn a lot from him.”

Pleased with my response, Dad rolled up his sleeves. “Now, here is the strategy for you two. Da, you are still fresh. You're going to help your brother. You'll make a
schedule and study together.” I was surprised. Jin, who was two sisters away from me, had been in first grade when I was still crawling around in my diapers fighting for food with the chickens in the courtyard. Now I was to help him. My heart beat with pride. With a little hard work and a bit of determination, I had won my dad's respect.

“That will be great,” I said, turning to my brother. “I have all the books.”

“I'm not really sure about college; I've been away from books for too long.” Jin sounded pessimistic. He had always been my opposite in many ways. He was calm and wise, never one to take center stage. When it came to a major decision, we always had to push and shove him a little. I hoped for victory, while he worried about failure.

“You can do it,” Dad told Jin. “You were the math wizard of your class in junior high. You will devote your time to learning the other subjects over the next seven months. Don't worry, son, I feel lucky this year.

“Son, this is the chance of a lifetime,” he went on, turning to me. “I thought you guys would never have the opportunity to dream about college. Now Mao has gone west and you're given a chance to try. The Chen men have never been known for lack of talent, only for lack of opportunity.”

He turned again to my brother, lit another cigarette for him, and said, “Jin, you have the advantage of being more mature. Da, you have the energy. Work together like brothers should, make up for the disadvantages, and both of you will win this time. All you need to do is work hard. Jin, if you as a teenager could farm like an adult to support this family, then there is no college, I mean no college under the sun, that should be too hard for you to get into. We are behind
you all the way. And you, Da, have no reason to even consider anything other than your first choice of college. Beijing. Shanghai. Anywhere your heart belongs.

“Young men, you don't know how lucky you are. Look at your sisters. They weren't even allowed to finish elementary school.” Dad ended his speech, his eyes fiery. The conversation had turned from father-son chitchat into an admiral's final order.
The enemy is at the front door. Now go get them, sons.

Jin quietly put out his cigarette and said to me, “Tomorrow, wake me when you get up. Let me get a feel of what's going on; then we'll sit down and talk. Make me work hard if you see me slack off, little brother. We'll work together.”

“Sure thing.”

Dad filled our cups again and symbolically drank his in one gulp. He had said enough. Now it was up to us.

“Bottoms up.” I toasted my brother and rose to leave. When I pushed the door open, Mom was right behind it and had probably been listening to the whole conversation.

I climbed the stairs to my room and sat down at my desk, which was covered with piles of books. The sense of a sacred mission swept through my heart. Just before this pep talk, college had been a young man's romantic ideal. Now it was a reality full of emotions. If I failed, I failed the whole family all the way back to our earliest ancestor, whose tombstone had long ago become sand. If I succeeded, the family's ship would sail again. It was about pride, humiliation, revenge, dignity, and vindication of the family name.

I compiled two lists. One was a checklist of everything my brother needed to do to catch up with me. The other was my own list of dos and don'ts, a sort of New Year's resolution. On
it were no movies, no plays, no sports, no more time off until after the Big One. Tonight would be my last night out with my friends.

A popular local melody was being badly distorted by a whistler just below my window. The nightingale was Siang, the designated messenger from the gang.

I closed my book, went to the kitchen, and picked up the food basket Mom had prepared for my friends. When I had asked her for the food, I had promised her that it was my last night out with them, that from now on, I would shut my door and bury my head in my books.

“What a terrible whistler,” Mom said. “Why don't they come in?”

“Because they're afraid of you.”

“Why?”

“Because you're a good person,” I replied.

“How strange.”

“Well, my friends aren't afraid of bad people, they deal with them all day long and beat them up all the time. But when they meet a good person like you, they don't know what to do. They turn shy and stay in the dark.” Mom shook her head and wiped her hands on her apron.

When I pushed the door open at Yi's, no one jumped out to throw me to the floor or pinch my neck. It was quiet. Four heads, a cloud of smoke rising above them, slumped between legs.

“Hey, brothers, the food is here. Why is everyone so quiet?”

“We lost half our money,” Sen said in a low voice. His eyebrows were locked together, a hairy mess.

“How?” My heart dropped. Five hundred yuan gone like the wind. “That's impossible. You guys are the quickest
hands north of the equator and east of the Western world.” I shook Mo Gong's fuzzy head. His neck was boneless, like a rubber pipe. The picture of prosperity only hours ago, he was now a deflated balloon.

“We were doing fine at the beginning, wiping out people like a typhoon. I mean big hands. Then someone sneaked from the fields and reported us to the commune. They sent in a battalion and cleaned our pockets. Good thing we made for the sugarcane—that's why we're not sitting stinking in the commune jail.”

“But the police got our names,” Siang said. “It's only a matter of hours before they come and knock at our door.”

“What? Who reported it?” I asked.

“Some guy from another village. We'll take care of him sooner or later.”

“So let's eat first and then run,” I said.

“I don't think we have time to eat. But we need some money; we're broke,” Sen said.

“What about the other half of the money?” I asked.

“In the field. We buried it. We'll get it later. Now ain't a good time,” Sen replied.

“Here.” I dug into my pocket and took out about ten yuan. “Not much, but take this for now.”

“That's a lotta money,” Yi said.

“Don't worry. I have no place to spend it,” I said, pushing the money into Sen's hands. He took it slowly.

“Thanks, Da, you're a real pal. We'll borrow it,” he said, his head low.

“It's nothing, and it's not enough for you guys. Hey, if you wait, I could go home and get some more.” I was thinking of borrowing from my brother.

“No, no, we're leaving now,” Sen said.

“Do you have to?” All four heads nodded in unison.

“Listen, if we go now, we'll be in Putien in a few hours. We'll stay at Yi's and make another living there. If we don't, it'll be jail time.”

“Eat the food up, please, or you'll be hungry.” I opened the basket.

The smells of fried fish, roasted pork, noodles, and New Year's rice cakes permeated the room and opened their eyes.

“Here, use your hands. Eat.” Four pairs of hands fought for the juiciest pieces. Soon Mo Gong was licking the bottom of the meat plate and Siang was burping. Sen wiped his greasy hands on his hair, a habit he had since he was young, and Yi picked his teeth. A perfect last supper.

The four of them touched me with their greasy hands before leaving. Sen whispered to me, “Work hard, college man. Make us proud.” I carried the empty basket home, feeling like a fugitive myself. My friends had vanished into the darkness. All I could hear was the clanking of the old bike.

The first day back from the New Year's break, Dia sported a brand-new army green Mao jacket. One of the pockets was already missing a button. He stood outside our door and looked as dopey as a bridegroom.

“Hey, happy New Year, and how in the world did you make the girl marry you?” I faked a frown and crossed my arms across my chest.

Dia rubbed his reddened face. “This thing?” His hands smoothed the wrinkles on his jacket. “Mom made it for my elder brother and the stupid guy washed it in boiling water. It shrank two sizes. Now I gotta wear it. I took the button off to look more casual.”

We chose the narrow path between two green wheat fields, still wet from the melting frost. The morning sun gleamed through the fog. The trees, road, and endless fields looked like an Impressionist painting, fuzzy.

“I feel ashamed walking beside you, you know,” Dia suddenly said.

“Why?”

“I heard that you locked yourself up in your room and banged your head against the wall studying, and that you didn't even take New Year's Day off. You didn't, did you, you son-of-a-gun?”

“That was pure rumor. I had a great time this holiday.”

“Not true. I have my source.”

“I wouldn't rely on it entirely,” I teased him.

“Wait.” Dia ran in front of me. “I heard something you might wanna hear.”

“What?”

“About your friends.”

“What about them?”

“You haven't heard anything?”

“No, I haven't heard from them since they skipped town on New Year's.”

“Don't pull my leg.” Dia stopped me in the middle of the narrow road. His small eyes radiated sincerity.

“I swear to Buddha,” I said. “Tell me what you heard.”

“Okay, here's a clue. Money.”

“Money? What money are you talking about?” My heart sank. Even Dia knew about their fortune.

“You sure you don't know anything about this? Okay, the rumor out there had it that Siang stole about a thousand yuan from the commune's shoe factory his father runs. That's why he's been hiding out with his friends.” The news hit me like a fist. Siang, a thief ? On the run? I recalled the glee on my friends' faces on New Year's Day. They had been so full of joy.

That one thousand yuan had to have been money they'd won honestly.

Siang wouldn't steal. My sworn friends wouldn't lie to me about where they had gotten the fortune. It hadn't been in their eyes. There had been no fear. It was money that had come from bravery and their ability to take a calculated risk at the gambling table.

“You don't believe me, do you?” Dia asked.

“No, I don't. They told me a different story.”

“What? They told you about the money?”

I realized my slip of the tongue. “Forget it, Dia. We didn't have this conversation, okay?”

“Hey, slow down. I'm your best friend. Trust me. The commune is investigating the whole thing now and they can't prove whether Siang really has the money that he was accused of stealing.”

Holy shit, I could have given the truth away. I was glad I was only talking to Dia, someone in whom I could confide my darkest secrets. “What else did you hear?”

“That he stole the money to gamble, but there's another rumor that the shoe factory's one thousand yuan might have been stolen by its bookkeeper or someone from the inside. Someone knew that Siang was in possession of a fortune and framed him. He was easy pickings. You know he hangs around the shoe factory and is good friends with the treasurer.”