The Explosion Chronicles

by Yan Lianke

  Minghui felt as though a bucket of cold water had been poured over him and gradually realized that Second Brother was still the same brother he had known—the same Kong Mingliang who had led the residents of Explosion on those secret expeditions. After he was appointed town mayor, Mingliang once took some people to beat those residents of Explosion who were unable to stop stealing, though he himself never completely abandoned the habit either. After he was appointed county mayor and city mayor, he definitely wouldn’t openly steal anymore, though he never did cure himself of the habit of casually taking things. All of the carefully dated slippers taken from hotel rooms and towels taken from airplanes, together with a matchbox filled with three-inch-long matches taken from the home or reception room of some official in Beijing—these demonstrated that Mingliang not only stole when he was village chief, but also continued stealing whenever he had a chance even as town mayor, county mayor, and city mayor. The only catch was that he never stole anything of value but rather merely pocketed an assortment of random items, the same way that many people, after they finish eating, will take the toothpicks and napkins sitting on the table. Mingliang brought these stolen items home, then he carefully placed them on display in this secret room. Here, Minghui rediscovered the Mingliang he had once known, and as he was reminiscing he heard the sound of Mingliang’s footsteps approaching.

  Minghui looked in the direction of the footsteps and, without turning off the light, he walked out of the secret room, passed through the bathroom, and returned to the display case of foreign gifts on the eastern side of Second Brother’s office. He saw that in the office doorway, a young man even taller than Second Brother was standing, handsomely dressed in a suit, with a crew cut, and a face so white that there wasn’t even a hint of color. Meanwhile, the briefcase he was holding was so black it looked fake. However, his bright smile was utterly genuine.

  “I’m Mayor Kong’s secretary, Secretary Liu. In order to have Explosion City redesignated as a metropolis, Mayor Kong has had to return to Beijing to make a report. Before he boarded the plane, the mayor told me to ask you what happened at home that has made you so anxious.”

  Minghui stood flabbergasted and, after a moment, responded, “Nothing has happened at home. I just need to see him.”

  With a soft smile like an autumn leaf falling on that square face in the doorway, it felt as though an extreme chill had suddenly fallen, as if all the warmth in the room suddenly disappeared. Minghui saw Mingliang suddenly disappear from in front of his eyes, like a breeze blowing through a crack in a door.

  3. KONG MINGHUI

  Because his heart was icy cold, the ground outside was frozen, the marble stones in the city square were covered in frost, and even the oil left behind by a car had become lumps of ice. The car had stopped by the side of the road, and the driver was hunched over, blowing on his hands while stomping his feet and cursing nonstop: “Fuck, Fuck!” But he couldn’t get the car started again.

  Unable to endure the bitter cold, Minghui decided to go see his third brother, Kong Mingyao.

  Minghui’s visit with Third Brother was exactly the opposite of his visit with Second Brother and was as straightforward as opening and closing a door. He went to the base of the mining company building, where he told the sentry that he was Kong Minghui, the fourth brother of Kong Mingyao, whereupon the sentry quickly called up the office building. As soon as Minghui entered the building, Mingyao was there waiting for him in the first-floor hall. All of Explosion—including the old city district, the city’s east side, its west side, and the development zone—was frozen solid and covered in snow. Minghui trudged in from outside, trying to get warm, and saw Mingyao wearing a munitions belt and standing in front of a Lohan bamboo. Because of the cold, the bamboo plant’s leaves had fallen off, but at that moment, as Mingyao looked at the bare plant, he removed his arms belt and placed it next to the bamboo, and the plant began emitting warm sounds as it produced streaks of green.

  Mingyao then touched the plant, and countless green buds appeared on the bare branches.

  Minghui walked over, looked at the new buds, then looked at his brother’s face. Just as Minghui was about to say something, his brother asked,

  “Is it very cold outside?

  “It’s somewhat warmer upstairs,” Mingyao added, as he took Minghui to his sand table room on the eighth floor. Apart from the maps of the world, the United States, England, France, and Germany hanging on the wall, next to the map of the United States, which was half as large as the room itself, there was an equally large map of Afghanistan and Iraq. On the eastern side of the office, in addition to the sand table maps of the United States, Japan, and Taiwan, there was an unfinished sand table map of Afghanistan and Iraq—some craftsmen were in the process of using Bakelite and clay to create a sand table model of Iraq, but when they saw Minghui and Mingyao approach, their clay-covered hands were suspended in midair. Mingyao gestured for the craftsmen to continue their work, while he sat down with his brother and had someone pour them some water. Seeing that Minghui was warming up and was no longer shivering, Mingyao asked him why he had come.

  After recounting how the previous day he had failed to see Second Brother, Minghui sighed and said,

  “It’s as if we weren’t even brothers anymore.”

  Mingyao saw Minghui’s expression and then reflected for a while before saying,

  “The United States might attack Iraq.”

  Minghui said, “It’s as if Mother were sick, because she keeps talking about you every minute of every day.”

  Mingyao said, “I never expected that the world could become so chaotic, and it’s entirely the fault of the United States.”

  Minghui said, “If only Eldest Brother and Sister-in-Law were here… .”

  Mingyao was silent for a moment, then asked, “Do you want me to remove Second Brother from his position as mayor? Do you want me to have him return home to live with Second Sister-in-Law?”

  Minghui didn’t know what to say and instead just stared at Mingyao.

  Eventually, Mingyao realized that Minghui wasn’t going to say anything, so he continued softly, “Brother, you should leave. It’s too soon to bring Second Brother down. You should look after things at home, until the situation in the Middle East has been sorted out and I have restored peace to the world—if Second Brother still hasn’t returned home by that point, I can force him to return, and can organize a dinner for all four brothers, where we can discuss our family responsibilities.” Then Mingyao stood up, looking as though he were about to see Minghui out. Minghui stood up as well, placed his unfinished cup of tea on the table, and watched in astonishment as Mingyao went over to the sand table to tell the craftsmen to make the city of Baghdad twice as big, so that every street and alley could be clearly visible. Then Mingyao escorted Minghui out.

  4. MOTHER

  Mother died.

  With a warm smile, she departed this cold world.

  Not even heaven could have anticipated that that year’s winter would be so bitterly cold. After Minghui left Mingyao’s office, he ran home. He rushed inside and closed the courtyard gate, and the first thing he saw was that the trunk of the courtyard’s old elm tree had frozen solid and developed several finger-size cracks, revealing the pristine white wood inside. He saw that a rice bowl that had been forgotten on a windowsill had frozen and shattered, with shards scattered all over the ground. When he walked inside, he saw that the hour and minute hands of the clock on the wall over the bed were frozen in place, while the red second hand had fallen off completely and was stuck in the bedding like a needle.

  Minghui froze.

  He stood in the doorway for a long time and then eventually ran toward the inner room. “Mother … Mother …” he shouted, his voice like a piece of bamboo that has been split open. Before he had even run out of his own room, his voice had caused the door to the main room to open. He proceeded to the doorway and shouted, “Ma, are you OK? … Ma, are you OK?” His cries caused the curtain
to his mother’s room to open, and he rushed inside and saw that his mother was still lying in bed. Her complexion, however, was no longer bright and rosy, as it had been when he left her, and instead it was pale and mottled. She was facing the interior of the room, her eyes were half open, and she looked as though she had just seen something on the wall. It was as if a gust of bitterly cold air had blown through that wall and onto her face.

  “Mother is going to leave tonight, so you should tell her the truth. Have your eldest brother and his wife gotten back together? Has your second brother reconciled with his wife?

  “… Has your third brother married and started a family? Did he marry a woman from our old Explosion Street?

  “… You yourself are already one of the elders of our street. If you don’t hurry up and get married, this is the one thing I won’t be able to get over.

  “Minghui,” his mother added in a very weak voice, “you must answer these questions. After you do, Mother must go find your father.”

  Minghui did not know how he had suddenly become so composed, as though he had known all along that his mother would die. When he heard his mother’s questions, he slowly took several steps forward and then stood in the middle of the room, as though he were an incense stick stuck in front of her bed.

  “Eldest Sister-in-Law is pregnant with twins—a boy and a girl.

  “… Second Brother has taken Second Sister-in-Law into his home in the city hall complex, and every day when Second Brother goes in to work, Second Sister-in-Law stays home to cook and take their children to and from school.

  “… Third Brother is married. His wife is an instructor from Explosion and teaches my nephew, Little Victory.

  “I’m also engaged, to that girl you saw while sitting in your doorway before winter fell. She is pretty and virtuous, and works in the hospital. We plan to get married later this year.”

  When he finished saying all of this, his mother turned over and faced him. On her lips she had a trace of a smile, which lasted several seconds, after which she closed her eyes for good.

  Before burying his mother, Mingliang signed a directive from Beijing ordering that the weather of Explosion City must improve, and therefore the weather warmed up and the sun overhead became so hot that people wanted to take off their padded clothes. When Minghui finally received a phone call from Mingliang, he told Mingliang that their mother had died, whereupon Mingliang said that Explosion’s redesignation as a provincial-level metropolis was about to be approved. Minghui asked Mingliang if he was going to return home for the funeral, and Mingliang suggested that they leave things as they were for the moment, because the most important announcements were about to begin. When Minghui tried to find Mingyao to tell him about their mother’s death, he discovered that Mingyao was not at the mining company headquarters but rather had installed himself in some military barracks deep in the Balou Mountains. On that particular day, Mingyao was wearing his military uniform and was leading a spring training mobilization meeting for his troops, saying that the Japanese prime minister had again gone to visit the Yasukuni war shrine, while some Rightists had landed on China’s Diaoyu Islands. Taiwan’s Democratic Progressive Party had already secretly drafted a new constitution in anticipation of Taiwan’s independence. Meanwhile, in an attempt to overturn the Iraqi and Afghan governments, the United States was using the most advanced and most brutal equipment available, for which it was borrowing an enormous amount of money from China—as a result the value of the RMB had skyrocketed, making Chinese people want to hurl themselves from the tops of Beijing’s skyscrapers. Germany had originally agreed to sell China weapons but now went back on its promise. Even neighboring Vietnam, which was as tiny as a grass seed, was drilling for oil in China’s Spratly Islands. A Philippine printing company had even included China’s island on its own map, which was about to go to press. The messenger Minghui had sent to inform Mingyao of his mother’s death returned and told the rest of the Kong family,

  “Throughout history, there has never been a hero who has mastered the ideals of both loyalty and filial piety.”

  Together with Mingguang and his wife, Minghui dressed their smiling mother’s body and placed it in the coffin. Without troubling any of their neighbors, they buried their mother. That unusual winter snowfall had already melted on the sunny side of the hill, but the opposite side was still covered in pristine white snow, and a cold breeze was blowing over. From there, you could make out only the tops of Explosion’s distant high-rise buildings, just as you could see only the crowns of the trees in that forest in the ravine. From behind the buildings, however, a continuous rumbling sound could be heard coming from mining and quarry sites.

  After burying their mother in the same grave site where they had previously buried their father, Minghui and Mingguang were both exhausted, so they sat down in front of the grave to rest. They gazed out at the tops of the city’s buildings, the smoke from the mines, and the snow on the mountains in front of them. They could hear the sound of a train approaching from the other side of the mountains, as well as planes landing at the airport. Mingguang said to Minghui, “Let’s go back. It’s time to eat. For lunch, we can have dumplings.”

  They stood up, grabbed their shovels, and prepared to leave. At that point, however, Mingguang went up to Minghui and, with a smile, said quietly, “Your eldest sister-in-law is pregnant, with a son.”

  CHAPTER 17

  Great Geographic Transformation (1)

  1. MEGALOPOLIS (1)

  Mayor Kong Mingliang did not wake up on his own that morning but rather awoke in a shock. He initially didn’t want to open his eyes, so with his eyes still tightly closed he tapped on his bed’s yellow pear-wood headboard with his fingers. When the assistant standing outside his room heard the mayor tap three times on his headboard, he immediately went outside and used a bamboo pole to shoo away all of the sparrows that had gathered on the windowsills overnight. The assistant also summoned several young people and told them that if any sparrows or crows flew to the windows or to the trees in front, they should use the bamboo poles to shoo them away. But later, after everything had quieted down, the mayor could still hear something flying around, so he tapped even louder on his headboard.

  The assistant became anxious and instructed the three sentries standing guard in the courtyard of the city government building complex that they should stand a dozen meters from each other and that each of them should hold a long bamboo pole—and in this way they could prevent all sparrows from flying over. The courtyard’s garden was in the process of awakening from its winter slumber and, regardless of whether it was the flowers planted on either side of the stone path or the trees and flowers planted around the mayor’s house, everything had turned so green that it appeared as though the sap was about to gush out. The peonies in the greenhouse were the first to burst into bloom, looking as beautiful as a young girl’s face. When the sun came out, it shone down on the road that the mayor, after he woke up and got out of bed, would follow to go to work. That morning, when the gardeners were tending the flowers, the young men with the bamboo poles gestured toward their feet, indicating that they had taken off their shoes, whereupon the gardeners quickly removed their own shoes. Afraid of making a racket as they were arranging the flowers, they covered the edges of the flowerpots with their fingers and didn’t remove them until they had put the pots down.

  The enormous courtyard was like an ancient garden and was located several li to the east of the city government building. There was no one of consequence—only a vast wall and a set of empty villas and other buildings, together with cooks, gardeners, electricians, and other service workers. These people all gathered in the courtyard, like grass seeds in an empty field. They walked very quietly and whispered when they spoke. When they saw one another they would quickly nod. Particularly when Mayor Kong was about to go to sleep, the workers would remove their shoes. When his personal attendants entered his room, they would change into soft-soled slippers imported from Japa
n. They kept quiet not in order to avoid waking the mayor but rather because he had grown accustomed to silence. In the tile-roofed house Mingliang had built in the center of the city government courtyard, there was a corridor with many twists and turns, and the rooms were all linked to one another. Among those rooms there was a large meeting hall, a small meeting hall, a large and a small dining hall, a teahouse, and a coffeehouse, together with a workers’ dormitory that was located where the sun didn’t even shine. When the mayor was in his bedroom, if he needed anything he wouldn’t pick up the telephone or ring a bell but rather would simply tap the table or headboard, and this would notify his assistants. If he wanted to have a certain girl come sleep with him, he would tap his headboard with a slightly different intonation and his assistants would understand. Given that Mingliang worked very hard all day, he was even more appreciative of peace and quiet. In the morning, apart from the sound of the sun rising, there was no other sound to be heard. His assistants would even hold their breath as they were removing their shoes and shooing away the birds. But in this silence, Mingliang still felt that there was some sound coming from somewhere, and just as he was about to tap on his headboard out of annoyance, it occurred to him that the sound was not coming from the courtyard but instead was coming from the preternatural silence in his brain and the extreme isolation of the courtyard. When he realized this, his finger—which was about to tap on the headboard—suddenly froze.