Red Azalea (13 page)

This particular day, as I passed by the bridge I heard a local boatman calling me from his boat. He told me to come quickly; he had discovered a drowned body. I ran down to the boat. It was a female body. The boatman slowly flipped her over like an egg roll on a skillet. Before
me was Little Green. I lost my breath. Her face was puffed. Her whole head had swelled like a pumpkin. There were traces of cuts on her arms and legs. The boatman said, It looks like she had a fit. You see these cuts? She struggled, but got tangled in the weeds. I stood motionless.

Someone brought the news to Yan. She came running down from the bridge like a mad horse, with her hair standing back on its roots. Her face was blue and red as if it had been beaten. She wouldn’t listen when the boatman told her that it was useless to attempt mouth-to-mouth lifesaving. She’s been dead for hours, the boatman said. Yan kept pumping and pumping at Little Green’s chest. Heavy sweat ran down her hair in tiny streams. Her shirt soon was soaked. She didn’t stop until she completely exhausted herself.

The Red Fire Farm headquarters held a special memorial service for Little Green. She was honored as an Outstanding Comrade and was admitted posthumously into the Youth League of the Communist Party. Little Green’s grandmother attended the service. She was beautiful like her granddaughter. She had an opera singer’s elegance. She hugged Little Green. She had no tears in her eyes; her face was paler than the dead. Lu, representing the farm’s Party committee, issued her a check for 500 yuan as a condolence. Little Green’s grandmother took the check and stared at it.

Yan left suddenly. She did not come back for dinner. I went to look for her, searching everywhere before I finally found her sitting under the bridge. The jar which she used to collect the snakes was beside her. A few days ago she
told me in great delight that she had just reached the perfect number—one hundred snakes—and was expecting Little Green to come back to her senses magically.

I stepped closer to Yan and saw that she was pulling each snake’s head off its neck. The dark brown blood of the snakes spattered all over her face and uniform. When all the snakes were torn, she took up the jar and smashed it.

I went up to her. She crouched at my knees. I held her as she began to cry.

A
fter Little Green’s death Yan was no longer the Party secretary and commander that I knew. She changed me along with her. We discussed the reasons why we were losing sight of the “brilliant future” the Party had drawn. We asked ourselves why we were getting poorer and poorer when we had been working so hard on the land. Our monthly salary of 24 yuan barely covered food, kerosene and toilet paper. I had never been able to buy any new clothes for myself. Were we going to spend the rest of our lives this way? The irony was bitter: the Red Fire Farm was a model Communist collective, the wave of the future. It was one of ten farms in the East China Sea region. All of these farms—Red Star, Red Spark, May Fourth, May Seventh, Vanguard, East Sea, Long March, Sea Wind, Sea Harvest and our farm—with a total of over
200,000 city youth sent to work and live in the area, didn’t even grow enough food to feed themselves. The farms had been getting food supplements from the government every year. And the government had made it clear to the headquarters that we would not get any help next year. We asked ourselves what it really meant when we shouted, “Sweating hard, growing more crops to support the world’s revolution.”

Yan lost interest in conducting political study meetings. She became vulnerable, weak and sad. We had fights. She said she wanted to quit her position. She said she was no longer the right person for the job. Lu fit it much better. I said I did not like seeing her become decadent. Dispiritedness would not save us. She said quitting was her way. I asked, What would happen after you quit and Lu took power? Would we be sleeping together? She said, I didn’t know you liked my power better than you liked me. I said, It’s not the power you have in hand, it is our lives. You can’t make it better but you can make it worse. She said her life was a waste, it was a jail here. I said, Where could we go? How could we escape? There were nets above and snares below. We run, we die. Mao and the Party had set our fate. We must drag on.

Yan left for seven days’ intensive political training at the farm headquarters. I slept alone. And I became upset. I was afraid of losing her when she and Leopard met again. It was a strange feeling, a feeling of continuous distraction. I dreamt of Yan at night. I looked forward to the sunset
when the day announced its end. She became my lover in her absence. At sunset a new feeling was born, for her. Its color crossed out my heart’s darkness.

I wrote to my parents in Shanghai. I told them about the Party secretary, Commander Yan. I said we were very good friends. She was a fair boss. She was like a big tree with crowded branches and lush foliage, and I enjoyed the cool air sitting under her. This was as far as I could go in explaining myself. I told my mother the farm was fine and I was fine. I mentioned that some of my roommates’ parents had made visits although the farm was not worth the trip.

My mother came instead of writing back. I was in the middle of spraying chemicals. Orchid told me that my mother had arrived. I did not believe her. She pointed to a lady coated in dust standing on the path. Now tell me I was lying, she said. I took off the chemical container and walked toward my mother. Mom, I said, who told you to come? Mother smiled and said, A mother can always find her child. I kneeled down to take off her shoes. Her feet were swollen. I poured her a bowl of water. She asked how heavy the fungicide-chemical container was. Sixty pounds, I said. Mother said, Your back is soaked. I said, I know. Mother said, It’s good that you work hard. I told her that I was the platoon leader.

Mother said she was proud. I said I was glad. She said she did not bring anything because Blooming had just graduated from the middle school and was assigned to a professional boarding school. Her Shanghai resident number
was also taken away. We have no money to buy her a new blanket; she still uses the one you left. It’s good to be frugal, don’t you think? Mother said. What about Coral? I asked. Will she be assigned to a factory? Mother nodded and said she had been praying for that to happen. But it’s hard to say. Mother shook her head. Coral is afraid of leaving. The school people said that if she showed a physical disability, her chances of staying in Shanghai would be much better. Coral did not go to see a doctor while she was having serious dysentery. She was trying to destroy her intestine to claim disability. That was stupid, but we were not able to stop her. A lot of youths in the neighborhood are doing the same thing; they are scared to be assigned to the farms. Coral is very unhappy. She said she had never asked to be born, she said that to my face. My child said that to my face.

I placed Mother in Yan’s bed that night. I wanted to talk to my mother but instead fell asleep the minute my head hit the pillow. The next morning Mother said she’d better leave. She said that I should not feel sorry for myself. It shows weakness. And her presence might have increased my weakness and that was not her intention in being here. She should not be here to make my soldiers’ homesickness worse. I could not say that I was not feeling weak. I could not say my behavior would not influence the others. I wanted to cry in my mother’s arms, but I was an adult since the age of five. She must see me be strong. Or she would not survive. She depended on me. I asked if she would like me to give her a tour of the farm. She said she had seen enough. The salty bare land was enough. She said it was time for her to go back.

Mother did not ask about Yan, about whose bed she had slept in the previous night. I wished she had. I wished I could tell her some of my real life. But mother did not ask. I knew Yan’s title of Party secretary was the reason. Mother was afraid of Party secretaries. She was a victim of every one of them. She ran away before I introduced Yan.

Mother refused to allow me to accompany her to the farm’s bus station. She was insistent. She walked away by herself in the dust. Despite Lu’s objection to a few hours’ absence, I went to follow my mother through the cotton field. For three miles she didn’t take a rest. She was walking away from what she had seen—the land, the daughters of Shanghai, the prison. She ran away like a child. I watched her while she waited for the bus. She looked older than her age: my mother was forty-three but looked sixty or older.

When the bus carried Mother away, I ran into the cotton fields. I exhausted myself and lay down flat on my back. I cried and called Yan’s name.

The day she was expected back, I walked miles to greet her. When her tractor appeared at a crossroad, my heart was about to jump out of my mouth. She jumped off and ran toward me. Her scarf blew off. The tractor drove on. Standing before me, she was so handsome in her uniform.

Did you see him? I asked, picking up her scarf and giving it back to her. Leopard? She smiled taking the scarf. And? I said. She asked me not to mention Leopard’s name anymore in our conversation. It’s all over and it
never happened. I asked what happened. She said, Nothing. We didn’t know each other. We were strangers as before. Was he there? I was persistent. Yes, he was. Did you talk? Yes, we said hello. What else? What what else? We read our companies’ reports, and that was all.

She did not look hurt. Her lovesickness was gone. She said, Our great leader Chairman Mao teaches us, “A proletarian must liberate himself first to liberate the world.” She scraped my nose. I said, You smell of soap. She said she had a bath at the headquarters. It was their special treat to branch Party secretaries. She had something important to tell me. She said she would be leaving the company soon.

I closed my eyes and relaxed in her arms. We lay quietly for a long time. Now I wish you were a man, I said. She said she knew that. She held me tighter. I listened to the sound of her heart pounding. We pretended that we were not sad. We were brave.

She had told me that she was assigned to a remote company, Company Thirty. They need a Party secretary and commander to lead eight hundred youths. Why you? Why not Lu? It’s an order, she said to me. I don’t belong to myself. I asked whether the new company was very far. She said she was afraid so. I asked about the land condition there. She said it was horrible, the same as here, in fact worse, because it was closer to the sea. I asked if she wanted to go there. She said she had no confidence in conquering that land. She said she did not know how she had become so afraid. She said she did not want to leave
me. She smiled sadly and recited a saying: “When the guest leaves, the tea will soon get cold.” I said my cup of tea would never get cold.

Lu turned the light off early. The company had had a long day reaping the rice. The snoring in the room was rising and falling. I was watching the moonlight when Yan’s hands tenderly touched my face. Her hands soothed my neck and shoulders. She said she must bear the pain of leaving me. Tears welled up in my eyes. I thought of Little Green and the bookish man. Their joy and the price they paid. I wept. Yan held me. She said she could not stop herself. Her thirst was dreadful.

She covered us with blankets. We breathed each other’s breath. She pulled my hands to touch her chest. She caressed me, trembling herself. She murmured that she wished she could tell me how happy I made her feel. I asked if to her I was Leopard. She enveloped me in her arms. She said there never was a Leopard. It was I who created Leopard. I said it was an assignment given by her. She said, You did a very good job. I asked if we knew what we were doing. She said she knew nothing but the Little Red Book. I asked how the quotation applied to the situation. She recited, “One learns to fight the war by fighting the war.”

I said I could not see her because my tears kept welling up. She whispered, Forget about my departure for now. I said I could not. She said I want you to obey me. You always did good when you obeyed me. She licked
my tears and said this was how she was going to remember us.

I moved my hands slowly through her shirt. She pulled my fingers to unbutton her bra. The buttons were tight, five of them. Finally, the last one came off. The moment I touched her breasts, I felt a sweet shock. My heart beat disorderly. A wild horse broke off its reins. She whispered something I could not hear. She was melting snow. I did not know what role I was playing anymore: her imagined man or myself. I was drawn to her. The horse kept running wild. I went where the sun rose. Her lips were the color of a tomato. There was a gale mixed with thunder inside of me. I was spellbound by desire. I wanted to be touched. Her hands skimmed my breasts. My mind maddened. My senses cheered frantically in a raging fire. I begged her to hold me tight. I heard a little voice rising in the back of my head demanding me to stop. As I hesitated, she caught my lips and kissed me fervently. The little voice disappeared. I lost myself in the caresses.

Yan did not go to Company Thirty. The order was canceled because headquarters was unable to connect the drinking-water pipe there. We shouted “A long, long life to Chairman Mao” when we got the news. Lu was unhappy. She would have taken Yan’s position if Yan had gone. She said it was the rain. It rained too much and it spoiled her luck.

It was May. The crops were shooting. For the past five months headquarters had ordered the company leaders to
pay attention to their soldiers’ political awareness. Only when the minds have politically advanced will the quantity and quality of the products be advanced. This is the key to our economic success. Lu read the instruction loudly to the company. She said that every soldier was required to give a speech at the nightly self-criticism meeting. Lu became angry during these meetings when, as usual, two-thirds of the people dozed off. Lu said that there must be a class enemy hiding in the ranks. We must stretch tight the string of the class struggle in our minds to stay invincible, she said.

To push us to work harder, Lu also passed down an order: one would be allowed to pee or shit only two times a day during working hours and could stay in the restroom no longer than five minutes. Anyone who broke this rule would be seriously criticized. Only the lazy donkeys shit more than that, Lu said. And lazy donkeys deserve to be ruthlessly beaten!