by Yu Hua
It was Lin Meng. I heard Pingping saying, with a quiver in her voice, “How come you’re back?”
The door must have opened; Lin Meng had come in. “Today I was sent out to pick up a shipment,” I heard him say. “I was desperate for a pee, but I couldn’t find a toilet anywhere on the road, so I had to rush back home.”
Lin Meng seemed to charge like a wild boar toward the bathroom. As he tugged at the bathroom door, he suddenly went quiet. He must have been shocked to find the door locked, and I heard him ask Pingping in a flustered voice, “Is there someone in there?”
Pingping must have nodded, for the next thing I heard was Lin Meng bellowing, “Who’s in there?”
Inside the bathroom, I couldn’t help but grin. Before I had the chance to reply, Lin Meng started kicking the door and shouting, “Come out of there!”
At this stage, I had only just squatted down and had had no time to do my business, but given how the door was shuddering under the impact of his kicks I had no choice but to pull up my pants, fasten my belt, and open the bathroom door. When Lin Meng saw it was me, he was dumbfounded. “Lin Meng, I haven’t finished yet,” I said, “but you were kicking the door so loud. I was about to dump my load, but with you kicking like that, it went back in again.”
Lin Meng stared at me, his eyes as big as saucers. “I never expected it would be you!” he said, through clenched teeth.
His expression made me laugh out loud. “Don’t look at me that way,” I said.
But Lin Meng just carried on staring, and pointed at me, as well. I kept my distance from his extended forefinger. “You’re giving me the shivers,” I said.
“It’s you who’s giving me the shivers!” Lin Meng roared.
His shouting so alarmed me that I began to take his indignation seriously. “What’s the matter?” I asked.
“I had no idea you would carry on with my wife,” he said.
“Carry on?” I said. “What do you mean ‘carry on’?”
“Cut out the playacting,” he said.
I threw a glance at Pingping, hoping to get some idea of what Lin Meng was on about, but I found her face had gone completely white, like a sheet of paper, with just a trace of gray around her lips. The way she looked made me even more uneasy. Now I understood what Lin Meng had in mind. He thought I had slept with Pingping. “Lin Meng,” I said, “you’re making a big mistake. There’s absolutely nothing going on between me and her.”
I saw that she was nodding, but Lin Meng seemed not to have the slightest interest in my declaration or in her nod. He pointed at me. “You can give up trying to deny it,” he said. “As soon as I came in the door, I could see she was acting strange. Right away I knew there was something fishy going on.”
“No,” I said. “What you think happened didn’t happen at all.”
“It didn’t happen?” He took a step forward. “Why were you hiding in the bathroom?”
“I wasn’t hiding in the bathroom,” I said.
He pointed at the bathroom. “What’s this—the kitchen?”
“It’s not the kitchen, it’s the bathroom,” I said. “But I wasn’t hiding there, I was having a crap.”
“Bullshit!” With this, he ran over to the toilet and took a look down, then stood triumphantly by the door. “Why don’t I see any crap?” he said.
“I didn’t have time to do it,” I told him. “The way you were kicking the door, it wouldn’t come out.”
“Who are you trying to kid?” He waved his hand contemptuously, and then spun on his heel and dived into the bathroom, slamming the door shut, and I heard him saying inside, “The two of you have got me so mad I’m losing my senses. I practically forgot I was dying for a pee.”
I could hear his urine splattering on the toilet. I took a look at Pingping. She was now sitting on a chair. Her face was buried in her hands and her shoulders were trembling. I went over to her. “What on earth is happening?” I asked. “I still don’t get what’s going on.”
Pingping raised her head and looked at me. There were tears on her face now, but what really struck me was her look of sheer panic. It seemed as though she wasn’t really clear what was happening either. At this moment the bathroom door was thrown open. When Lin Meng came out, it was as if he were a different person, calmed by his peeing. “Sit down,” he said to me.
I remained standing. He gave a smile that I didn’t expect. “Have a seat,” he repeated. “Why not?”
He spoke in a tone that would have made you think nothing at all had happened. My thoughts in an uproar, I sat down next to Pingping. Next thing, Lin Meng came over with pen and paper in his hand and sat down too. “You’ve let me down,” he said to Pingping.
She looked up. “No, I haven’t.”
Lin Meng ignored her. “You’ve let me down,” he continued, “but I’m not going to beat you, and I’m not going to call you names.”
“I haven’t,” Pingping repeated. “I haven’t let you down.”
Lin Meng was losing patience. He waved his hand in the air. “No matter what you say, I’m sure you’ve let me down, so stop all this nonsense! Just keep quiet and listen to what I’m going to tell you. We can’t go on living together, do you understand?”
Pingping looked at him, bewilderment on her face. He glanced at me and went on. “Is that clear? You and I have to get divorced, there’s no other way out.”
Tears streamed down Pingping’s face. “Why do we have to get divorced?” she said.
Lin Meng pointed at me. “You’ve gone to bed with him. Of course I’ve got to divorce you.”
“I didn’t,” she said.
At this stage, Pingping was still presenting her rebuttals in just the faintest of voices. I wasn’t at all happy about that. “You need to say it more forcefully,” I told her. “Say it to him loud and clear, there’s nothing going on between you and me. Bang the table if you like.”
Lin Meng laughed. “It’s useless, no matter how loudly she says it. How does it go? With right on your side, you can get anywhere; without it, you’ll get nowhere.”
“In this case it’s we who’re in the right,” I said, “you who’s in the wrong.”
Lin Meng gave another laugh. “Did you hear that?” he said to Pingping. “He’s saying ‘we,’ you and him. After I have divorced you, the two of you can get married.”
Pingping raised her head and looked at me. Her glance seemed like that of a woman who has just spotted a new partner. I waved my hand. “Pingping, don’t listen to his bullshit,” I said.
Pingping looked at her husband. He had begun to make marks on the paper with his pen. “I’ve worked it all out,” he said to her. “Our entire savings and cash on hand amount to 12,400 yuan. We each get 6,200. You take your choice of the TV or the VCR, and you can have your pick of the refrigerator and the washing machine …”
Seeing as how they were now discussing the division of property, I thought I shouldn’t hang around. “I’ll leave you to it,” I said. “I’m off.”
As I headed for the door, Lin Meng seized me by the arm. “You can’t leave now,” he said. “You’ve ruined our marriage, and now you have to face up to your responsibilities.”
“I didn’t ruin your marriage,” I said. “I haven’t ruined anyone’s marriage. What responsibilities do you want me to face up to?”
Lin Meng stood up and pushed me back into the chair where I’d just been sitting. Then he continued to discuss the division of property with Pingping. “Our own clothes, we take with us. The furniture we also divide equally. Of course, we need to apportion them reasonably—we can’t split the bed and the table in half … This apartment we don’t divide—it was yours before we got married, so you get to keep it.”
Then he turned to me and issued the following instruction: “After I have divorced Pingping, you have to marry her within a month.”
“You’ve no right to say that to me,” I said. “Whether you and Pingping divorce or not has got nothing to do with me.”
�
��You seduced her, you corrupted her, you induced her to commit adultery, and you’re telling me it’s got nothing to do with you?”
“I didn’t seduce her,” I said. “Ask Pingping: Did I or did I not seduce her?”
We looked at her. She shook her head back and forth. “Pingping, say it,” I said. “Did I or didn’t I?”
“You didn’t,” she said.
But she said this in the feeblest of voices. “Pingping, when you say this kind of thing,” I told her, “you need to be assertive. You mustn’t be so weak. When Lin Meng humiliates you in front of us, all you do is murmur, ‘That’s enough.’ You should stand up and issue a stinging rebuke.”
At this point, Lin Meng patted me on the back. “As a friend,” he said, “I want to give you some advice. Don’t try to convert Pingping into a shrew, because you’re going to be her husband in the future.”
“No, I’m not.” I said.
“You’re going to have to be.”
Lin Meng said this with such firm assurance that it quite unnerved me. Once again I turned to Pingping. “Just what is going on here? When I left my house, I had absolutely no idea of bringing a wife back with me—a woman, what’s more, who is the wife of a friend of mine. That would be bad enough, but what’s worse is that the woman is previously married and four years older than me. My parents would go ballistic …”
“That’s not true,” Lin Meng said. “Your parents are educated people. They wouldn’t be concerned about such things.”
“You’re wrong there—it’s educated people who are the most conservative.” I pointed at Pingping. “There’s no way my parents would accept her.”
“They’re just going to have to accept Pingping,” Lin Meng said.
“Just what is going on here?” Again I turned to her. “My brains are turning to mush. This is driving me crazy.”
Pingping was no longer weeping. “You shouldn’t have come here today,” she told me. “Having come, you should have left right away.”
Pointing at Lin Meng, she went on, “Although you guys are his friends, you don’t really know him at all.”
That was all she said, but it was enough to make things crystal clear. Now I understood why, as soon as I came in the door, Pingping was at such a loss what to do—it was because Lin Meng was not at home. Pingping was a bundle of nerves because I—a man who was not her husband—was alone with her. At the same time, I realized what kind of person Lin Meng was. “I used to think you were a broad-minded and generous person,” I told him. “But what you really are is small-minded and jealous.”
“You slept with my wife,” he said, “and you expect me to be broad-minded and generous?”
“I want you to know,” I said, pointing at his nose, “I’m completely sick of you. No matter what kind of garbage you spout, I can’t be bothered to argue with you. Pingping is the only person I’m worried about. I feel I’ve got her into trouble. I shouldn’t have come here today …”
Having said this, I started to get excited and waved my hand in the air. “No, I did the right thing by coming today! Pingping, it’s good that you and he are getting divorced. It’s just a disaster to live with this kind of guy. By coming today, I’ve rescued you. If I were your husband: one, I would respect you and never say things that would make you uncomfortable; two, I would be understanding and do my best to consider your needs; three, I would be genuinely broad-minded and generous, and not just put on a show; four, I would share the responsibility for household chores and not swagger around like a lord as soon as I get home, the way he does; five, I would never tell anybody else the nicknames that you give me; six, when you fall asleep in my arms every night, I wouldn’t be bothered by your breath on my neck; seven, I’m a lot stronger than he is, he’s all skin and bones …”
I kept going until I’d reached fifteen. After that I ran out of things to say and had to stop. When I took a look at Pingping I found her gazing at me with tears in her eyes, clearly moved by my words. Then I looked at Lin Meng. He was sniggering. “That’s good,” he said. “You put it so eloquently. I can relax now. I know you’ll be good to my ex-wife.”
“In saying these things, I don’t have any special agenda,” I replied. “It doesn’t mean I would definitely want to marry Pingping. Whether I marry her is not something just for me to decide. Is that what she would want? I don’t know. All I meant was, if I were her husband.”
I looked at her. “Pingping, isn’t that so?”
The trouble was, she mistook my meaning. “I’ll be your wife,” she said, with tears in her eyes. “After hearing what you said just now, I’m happy to be your wife.”
I was struck dumb. What an idiot, I thought. I had laid a trap for myself and jumped right into it. When I saw relief blossoming on Pingping’s face, I knew my chances of getting out of this were growing more and more remote. Her beauty was now on full display, her lovely eyes glistening as she gazed at me, the tears still flowing. “Pingping, don’t cry,” I said.
She raised a hand and brushed away her tears. My head was about to explode, I was so carried away. I was out of my mind now. I found myself saying to Lin Meng, in the tone of Pingping’s husband, “It’s time you left.”
He nodded in agreement. “Right, I should be going.”
I watched him as he jubilantly made his escape, and a thought occurred to me. I got the feeling that for ages now this guy had probably been looking forward to this very moment—he just hadn’t anticipated it would be me who would take over from him. After Lin Meng left, Pingping and I sat there together for a long time, neither of us saying a word, just thinking. Later, she asked me if I was hungry and whether she should go to the kitchen and prepare something. I shook my head. I wanted her to stay sitting. We sat there silently for a while, and then Pingping asked me if I regretted marrying her. I said no. She asked me what I was thinking about. “I feel as though I’m psychic,” I told her.
Pingping didn’t understand, so I explained. “When I was leaving the house, I made up a story for my parents about how you and Lin Meng had been in a fight, how you had knocked Lin Meng around until he was black-and-blue, how Lin Meng had knocked you around until you were black-and-blue … and now the two of you really are getting divorced. Wouldn’t you say I was psychic?”
Pingping made no response. I knew she still didn’t understand, so I explained more fully, giving her all the details of the story I had cooked up for my mom and dad, including the one about how she had smashed an ashtray on the top of Lin Meng’s head. When she heard this, Pingping waved her hand in protest, saying she would never do something like that. I said I knew that, I knew she wouldn’t, I knew she wasn’t a battleaxe. I was telling her these things only so she would realize I was psychic. Now, she understood. She nodded her head and smiled. But as she nodded I was shaking my head. “Actually, I’m not really psychic,” I said. “Though I predicted the discord between you and Lin Meng, I didn’t foresee I would end up as your husband.”
I looked at Pingping pathetically. “I haven’t a clue why I have to get married.”
FRIENDS
Kunshan left his house with a toothpick in one hand and a shiny kitchen cleaver in the other. He was threatening to slaughter Shi Gang. “Even if I decide to let him off with his life,” he said, “I’m still going to keep a piece of him as a souvenir.” As for just where this cut of meat would come from, Kunshan believed this would depend on how good a dodger Shi Gang proved to be.
It was lunchtime as Kunshan walked along the boulevard, chewing his toothpick, his eyes bloodshot, strands of tobacco caught in his mustache. As he walked, his lips were slightly curled and his jacket was open, revealing the work belt he wore inside. People could tell at a glance that he was off to have another fight. They tagged along behind, peppering him with questions. “Who is it?” “Kunshan, who are you after?” “Who is it this time?”
Kunshan cut an imposing figure as he marched along, and his retinue grew steadily more numerous. He came to a stop when he reache
d the bridge, and loudly spat the toothpick into the river below, then set down the cleaver on the concrete parapet and pulled a pack of Front Gate cigarettes from his pocket. He gave the pack a couple of shakes, and the tips of two cigarettes poked out. With his mouth he extracted one, then struck a match and lit up. He wasn’t sure yet in which direction he should go. He knew that to go to Shi Gang’s house he would need to turn west after crossing the bridge, and to go to the refinery where he worked he would need to go south. The problem was he didn’t know where Shi Gang would be just then.
As Kunshan inhaled, his nostrils flared. Now he began to scan the crowd of people gathered around him. As he looked grimly at their cheerful features, he noticed a thin bespectacled face. “Hey, you’re at the refinery, right?” he asked. The thin face moved closer. “You know Shi Gang?”
The man nodded. “We’re in the same shop.”
Kunshan soon established Shi Gang was still at work. He looked at his watch. It had just turned one, which meant Shi Gang’s shift had now ended and he’d be on his way to the bathhouse. Kunshan smiled thinly and went on leaning against the parapet. He took a few more puffs. It was at this point that he made his comments to the onlookers about slaughtering Shi Gang or, at the very least, chopping off a piece of him.
I was a boy of eleven then, on my way to the refinery. After lunch I had dumped my textbooks onto my bed, stuffed some clean clothes into my satchel along with a towel and soap, and asked my mother for ten fen. “I’m going to take a bath,” I told her.
With the satchel on my back I headed off, but not toward the public bathhouse in town. One had to pay for admission there, and I wanted to keep those ten fen for myself, so I headed for the refinery bathhouse instead. It was April, and the parasol trees were laden with broad leaves. The sun shone brightly, catching the dust thrown up from the street.
