Notes of a Crocodile

by Qiu Miaojin

  “How stupid is that, to hurt each other over nothing. That’s so sad. Have you tried talking to her since?”

  “She was actually really hurt. I could see it on her face.” Tun Tun shrugged helplessly. She squeezed her eyes shut, grimacing. “The moment I saw her face, I choked up. I knew I was wrong. I’d been too needy. I didn’t have the strength to make her come back, though. Once, I went all the way over to her house. I walked for half an hour to apologize to her, and I’d even thought of some things to say to make her laugh. When I got to her front door and rang the buzzer, she sent her little sister down to tell me to go away. And that’s when I lost my courage. I sat down on her front steps. I didn’t know what to do, if I should get up and go home. After summer vacation, I ran into her at school. We both looked the other way and didn’t say hi. Whenever I saw her coming, I tried to force myself not to run away, but my feet wouldn’t obey, and then my entire day would be ruined. Nowadays I hardly ever think about her, but of course, she’s in my dreams all the time. The dream goes on until I say, ‘Let’s not fight anymore.’ But she never responds. She just walks out, leaving me standing there.” There was frustration in Tun Tun’s eyes. I could tell that her dream had opened old wounds.

  “From the look in her eyes in the dream, I know she doesn’t blame me. She resents me. There’s a rift between us, but she has to learn not to lament for the dead. It’s like being struck in the heart with an arrow. It’s not about the arrow. The fact is, the damage is done.”

  I nodded. I could picture Zhi Rou in Tun Tun’s dream, the resentment in her eyes. I nodded again. I wanted more than anything to tell her “It isn’t so,” but it seemed as if those words were intended for myself. I simply couldn’t bring myself to say them. All I did was whisper, “She’ll regret it.” I was caught up in the moment, and the words crumbled inside of me.

  2

  If There were an encyclopedia on the subject of humanity, the scientific definition of a crocodile would be “a Hula-Hoop (or dead bolt, etc.) optimized for secretly falling in love with other people.” Ideally, the encyclopedia’s editor would be adept at the use of figurative language, though of course one would hope the same for the whole of humanity someday. Note on Hula-Hoop (or dead bolt, etc.): Once functional, it will emit affirmative noises.

  All its life, the crocodile had longed to meet its soul mate. Enough people had gathered to fill a truck, and the crocodile, happy as a pig in mud, was to be the truck’s driver. The passengers included the classmates it saw from dawn to dusk, the stinky-breathed manager of the manga shop, the saleslady from the toy department, and the young man in a tank top who heaved the trash into the garbage truck at night. There were only three dentists, while classmates accounted for the vast majority. There was the one whom it fancied who cleaned the blackboard and delivered bento boxes. There was another who would drool while taking afternoon naps. The crowd was growing. When the crocodile pulled up in its secret crushmobile, each of these people with their distinctive traits boarded the truck.

  The crocodile had a large wooden trunk, a kind of hope chest. The inside was partitioned like a honeycomb, and each partition was labeled with a name, a list of traits, and the date of first meeting. Inside each partition were the love letters the crocodile had written to its love interests. When the crocodile got home from work, it removed the sweat-soaked human suit clinging to its body and settled in for the night. Usually, it hid in the bedroom (“hid” because it feared the people on the living-room TV might burst in at any moment and discover its forbidden feelings for so many people). Upon opening the trunk, the crocodile kindled the flame it carried for each of its love interests. Whenever it grew sentimental, it blew its nose into a wad of toilet paper, then took out a note card and began penning the next reply in the series of letters from its imaginary lover.

  Kobo Abe. The name radiated through the curtains and into the crocodile’s bedroom. There was a slight change in the project. The crocodile reassigned all its love interests the alias of Kobo Abe, re-cataloging them. Most likely it was the crocodile’s reading of The Face of Another that had given rise to its secret crushes on human beings of all kinds. In the end, the crocodile had to pay its dues to the book that started it all.

  Dear Mr. Crocodile: Having received the tape of your first love letter to Kobo Abe, I could thank you until my pubes damn near fall out. I am loath to be included in that Pandora’s box of yours. To be desired ought to be a happy thing, but could it be that you remain ignorant of the fact that the torch has been passed to you? The suffering that we, a chorus of Kobo Abes, have undergone is tremendous. Take a cue from the media, and show them where you draw the line.

  3

  So it was April 1st. April Fools’ Day. I waited all day for Meng Sheng to come by, and he showed up at the last minute.

  I was in my attic room on Tingzhou Road. He climbed the five flights and crawled through the skylight, clambering over the barbed-wire fence around it. He made it all the way into the attic and knocked on my bedroom door. It was eleven p.m. This was about a year after he’d gotten into the philosophy program at my university. He’d scraped his hand on the barbed wire.

  “Hurry up. Come on. April 1st is almost over. If we don’t make it by midnight, we’ll miss Chu Kuang. You know about our relationship, right? Come with me to see him. Otherwise, if we’re left alone, one of us will wind up dead or injured.” Wiping off the dried blood with his other hand, he flashed a grim smile, then bellowed, “C’mon!”

  Every six months or so, Meng Sheng would appear out of nowhere. The way he would show up, it was as if you were walking down a busy street, and without warning, someone came up and gave you a friendly slap on the back. Ever since I’d met him, I felt as if somewhere in the intricate workings of my subconscious, some part of my psyche (possibly my ego) was constantly waiting for him to arrive, to get the fix that only he could give me.

  Meng Sheng led the way as we rushed to the dorm where Chu Kuang lived. When we discovered he wasn’t there, we pedaled at full speed to Zhongshan North Road and searched for him along a bar-lined strip. Spotting a pair of legs splayed out on the brick sidewalk, we found him underneath a bench. What made it even sillier was the fact that he’d worn a pristine white pair of jeans and a matching shirt. Drunkenly, he smiled at us.

  “Hey, I’m not even late this year. It’s only six minutes to twelve,” Meng Sheng blurted out. As we carried Chu Kuang back to his room, Meng Sheng said they needed to have a talk and that I should join them. There was a menacing look on his face as he slipped each of Chu Kuang’s two roommates a modest banknote, then told them to get out. It did the trick, and as if the message had been imparted with the flick of a knife, they left quickly. Meng Sheng had an imposing manner that implied he could break your neck if he wanted to, and everyone knew it.

  I scanned the wall of books at the far end of the room. Wooden shelves had been built to accommodate the window, and the sections were neatly labeled. Eighty percent of the books were in English, and among them were two giant anthologies of fiction and poetry. Each volume had Chu Kuang’s name written on it. Though there were four beds in the room, Chu Kuang occupied the space of two people. A three-shelf mahogany bookcase was used to divide the room in half. Cassettes and CDs were placed everywhere except on the bed, which was covered with a blanket. There was a separate shelf for the stereo, which had a medium-size set of silver speakers, and underneath were three rows of vinyl records stored in protective sleeves. Medical textbooks were piled on his desk, on which copies of works by Byron, Keats, Yeats, and other English-language poets were tossed. Books aside, music-related items filled more than half the space of the room. He had hardly any other possessions.

  Meng Sheng returned with the green tea he’d made and lifted the cup to Chu Kuang’s lips. He rocked Chu Kuang in his arms, slapping his face lightly. Then, kneeling and rolling up his sleeves, he started massaging him with a rhythmic, circular motion that escalated into full-on pounding. Chu Kuang laughed hyster
ically, pulling Meng Sheng toward him and pressing his forehead against his own. They were like two stones being struck together, the sparks intensifying with every blow. Finally, Meng Sheng pulled away. He sat in a chair and lit a cigarette. Chu Kuang let loose, the tears streaming down his chest. It was a grown man’s howl loosed from a cave at the bottom of the ocean. I had never witnessed such a thing before in my life, nor would I ever forget it. As he abandoned himself to grief, the flood of tears seemed inexhaustible, too much for his body to endure, but even so, his weeping persisted with the courage of conviction. Though I was only a bystander, there was no way I could remain detached. My eyes silently welled over. A tear formed in the corner of Meng Sheng’s eye, and he coldly wiped it away. It was cathartic for me, and neither of us felt pity for him. Tears, it seemed, had a life of their own. As dolphins hear the call of their shared language and must turn back toward their origins, the three of us found ourselves attuned to a common frequency. It was an experience too profound for words.

  “Well! That’s enough for one day, isn’t it?” Meng Sheng said to me as we all breathed a sigh of relief.

  “My thoughts exactly!” I said. I felt as if the three of us were on the same wavelength. We’d experienced a collective consciousness, if only for a fleeting instant. We’d stormed the fortress gates and returned to a place where souls, having no physical form, freely intermingled. In that moment of wonder, there was no distance between us.

  “What day is it today, anyway?” I asked, drying my eyes.

  “It’s April 1st. Chu Kuang and I met four years ago on this day. I broke up with him three years ago, when he got into college. I still saw him after that, but less often. When we split, he asked me to always meet him on the first of April. He said if I missed a year or forgot, he’d die.”

  “Is that a threat? What, is it ordained by some higher power?” I was skeptical.

  “No.” Meng Sheng shook his head, rubbing his eye. “Maybe you’ve never experienced it. To him, I’ve taken on too great a meaning in his life, though I wouldn’t say he’s living for someone else. It’s not that simple. He’s been carrying all this pain and sadness his whole life. He was already like that at eighteen, when we met. One day he decided to take his own life, and I stopped him.” He turned to look at Chu Kuang who, having cried himself into a stupor, was now slumped against him. He stroked Chu Kuang’s nose. “What a drama that was. I didn’t know him before that, I’d never even seen him. This was during my first year of high school, right after I went back. Chu Kuang was in his third year. It was the night of April 1st, and I’d just gotten out of school. I was leaving when he walked past me. For a split second, I saw this young man’s face magnified, like in a close-up. There, in that single expression, were all the feelings that had built up inside me that I couldn’t express. The face of a moribund man, its lines formed by a lifetime of anguish. Ah, he was the quintessential victim. I followed him to the bus stop and got on the bus. Got to the train station, transferred, took the train all the way to Keelung, and hopped on another bus. I sat next to him, but he didn’t notice me. He hung his head and he was in a fog, completely oblivious. After we finally had to get off the bus, he walked to a secluded beach. I wasn’t consciously trailing him this whole time. It was like sleepwalking. He had a magnetism, and I was drawn into his rite. I was still far from the water, and a large rock was blocking my path. I moved it out of the way, and the next thing I knew, I was wide awake. Something clicked, and I instantly caught up to him thirty feet ahead. I grabbed his arm and told him: ‘Don’t die.’ And that was the moment he was reborn.” He grinned and caressed Chu Kuang’s hair.

  “It was a stupid thing to say, though. At the end of the day, I have no right to tell other people what to do. Especially after realizing what a head case he was, I got sick of using my own will to control someone else’s. Grabbing him by the arm was acting without thinking. Gut instinct. After everything he’d gone through, he’d made the decision to assert his own will. I was the one who wanted him to live, but it wasn’t my choice to make. What connection did we have, really, that would justify my saying those words? I’ve thought about it, and I’d hate to but I’d do it all over again.” Meng Sheng put his head between his knees and twisted his hair in his hands. Chu Kuang sat up, gazing at him tenderly.

  “Meng Sheng, I trust you regardless. You don’t know what death is really like and don’t want to find out, so part of you is resisting death. And that part of you spoke up, that’s all. You didn’t want to let death in. Everyone has the same response,” I said. “There’s nothing wrong with that!”

  “Resisting death. That’s what it comes down to. It’s like you’re on autopilot: No matter how much you hate life, your body doggedly resists death. Even other people aren’t allowed to die. You still try to stop them.” Meng Sheng scoffed. “What a joke!”

  “So then what happened?” I wanted to know how it had turned into this.

  “Hey, it’s my turn to talk.” Chu Kuang’s eyes were puffy and red, and he sounded hoarse and congested. “When he grabbed me and said, ‘Don’t die,’ I started bawling like I did just now. I was two grades ahead of him, but he was more mature than I was, in every way. He told me to stop crying and called a cab to take me home. In fact, he handled it like he was the older one. He made me talk about what made me wish I was dead. He acts tough, all right, but he has a sensitive side, too. He appeared at my darkest hour, when I wanted nothing more than to feel exactly that kind of masculine warmth inside of me. Do you follow me, Sis? In his presence, I was a helpless little baby. I’d prayed for him, and now that he had come, I surrendered, willing to do anything he asked. I wished that he would snatch my soul or that I could have his body. Back in his room, he seemed to accept that he held this power over me, that I’d obey him. I couldn’t stop crying. After listening, he cried too. He had all kinds of pent-up desires, and I could tell that they were boiling over. It was very real, and very intense. He reached out to me in a way that neither of us had imagined. He reached over, and in one swift yet tender motion, removed my shirt and pants. And without a word, I submitted to him. That hand was shaking with emotion as it caressed me. So I took his hand and wrapped it around my cock. I don’t know where that idea came from, but my will to live had found an outlet, which had materialized before my very eyes. What is the human race, anyway, but a multitude of outlets for desires? There’s no suppressing the truths that arise from our experiences. Desires teach us lessons, and we have to go forth into the new worlds that we construct for ourselves.” Chu Kuang’s voice trembled. “When you can’t, that’s when you die.”

  “The new worlds that we construct.” I nodded. I knew exactly what he meant. “But some desires, once formed, are impossible to fulfill, so they become frustrations instead. That’s the problem with going forth into new worlds. By having another man grip your cock, you’ve gone beyond the perceived boundaries of your former world and delved into your carnal desires. You’ve retraced the roots of self-knowledge, experienced the primal frustrations, and transgressed the perceived boundaries. And you’ve managed to come back alive.” I expounded on Chu Kuang’s thoughts, which had stirred something within me. “You’ve emerged from a primordial state with newly constructed schemata, and lo and behold, you’re experiencing a whole new world. Right?”

  “Hey, I really like you, Sis. But why do you feel the same way, too?” Having recovered his composure, Chu Kuang seemed embarrassed at his outburst just a minute earlier.

  I didn’t answer. “So it was just a sudden impulse? It wasn’t love?” I asked. Meng Sheng had planted himself at the window and was staring out into the night.

  “Later on, it really was love. The happiest time of my life was my final year of high school. We’d go on endless walks at the edge of town. Other times we’d go to a deserted beach and watch the sunset, or make love on the hot sand. I’d recite poetry or read plays out loud to him. He’d brazenly put his arm around me as we walked home. It was an illicit love—a thi
ng so dangerous it refused to be contained, yet made of nothing but sweetness. But it had no future. Eventually women entered the picture. At first, he hid the fact that he’d been chasing women. But his interest in me gradually waned, and I found out. He was shameless, spending all his time with women. He told me straight up that he was going on a date, that he’d come see me when he needed a fix. I loved him too much and let myself be treated badly. Once, he even taunted me by bringing a girl over to my place and making me hide in the bathroom, watching him put the moves on her. I stood on top of the toilet all night, peering through the window over the door until my leg fell asleep and every last detail was burned into my memory. I knew I was damaged goods. So I grabbed a pair of scissors and stabbed myself in the thigh, left arm, and stomach—not deep, though. I managed to not cry out. I had to protect myself from the destructive side of his love. After I took the college exams, he broke it off completely. I was never going to satisfy him. The fact that he still needed a woman already adulterated our love, but being forced to watch the two of them was humiliating. I was living for someone else. I’ve given up hope that he’ll ever love me again, that those dreams will ever come true, and I’m not really saving my love for him. There was a line between us. He was on one side, and as long as I wanted to be on the same side as him, that line was blurred. Meng Sheng was my only reference point.” Chu Kuang rubbed his nose. Beads of sweat had formed around his mustache. Though he had stopped speaking, his mouth was twitching. His mannerisms could be comical even when he was upset.