by Bi Feiyu
It might have been only a transaction, but it was a substantial one, and well worth it, since she had come out ahead. With the teacher giving her his promise, she could not be unfeeling; and yet she felt bad. It wasn't pain, and it wasn't pleasure, just something that was hard for her to handle. She'd feel a lot better if she could scream. Yuyang might have been young, but no one needed to explain to her what went on between a man and a woman. She would never have consented if he'd asked her to do it. In fact, she would have threatened to scream if he'd asked, and she was grateful to him for not doing that.
It made a big difference to her. He was a man of his word. He hadn't taken off his clothes, so there was no reason to feel bad, just so long as he didn't make her do it with him. He was, after all, someone who had seen the world and weathered many storms; he knew how to take care of things. He showed his ample planning skills with the scheduling. No one would have expected him to ask Yuyang to come to his office every Sunday morning. Who'd have thought he was capable of doing that on a Sunday morning? No one would suspect a thing, which made it perfectly safe, and that put her mind at ease. Besides, her classmates' focus was on Pang Fenghua and the homeroom teacher; the more animated their gossip became, the less attention anyone would pay to Yuyang.
All along, she'd planned to wait till she'd gathered all the necessary intelligence before reporting to Wei Xiangdong, so she had no reason to hurry. One day—it made no difference when—she'd make that little bitch pay. Moving too soon could alert Fenghua, who might escape from her clutches. That would be a terrible loss. But Yuyang's youth betrayed her—she could not keep a secret.
One day, while she was sitting on Wei's lap, she could hold back no longer. She asked him if he knew the identity of the homeroom teacher's love interest. He produced the names of four or five young female teachers, but she shook her head and smiled.
"No, it's someone in my class," she said. His eyes lit up, a strange, eerie glint that seemed aimed at an invisible object. It was the glint of a tiger eyeing its prey. To Yuyang, that glare appeared to send steam into the air, to actually smoke.
"Really?" he asked. Encouraged by the light in his eyes, she nodded with certainty. "You're sure?" he asked.
Without a word, she went back to her dorm room to retrieve her diary and handed it to him. That was Yuyang's style. She'd rather act than talk, and let the facts speak for themselves.
"Why didn't you tell me earlier?" he asked sternly.
"The right to speak comes only after investigation," Yuyang said.
Nothing happened on campus for several days, which concerned Yuyang. The truly shocking event did not take place until Saturday night, though nothing out of the ordinary occurred during the day. After nightfall, not only did they not send for Pang Fenghua, they actually extended lights-out a full hour later and showed a couple of war movies. The teachers' weekend club was open, so lights blazed on campus, belying any sign of impending doom. At nine-thirty, the usual time for lights-out, Wei, flashlight in hand, made his move, followed by Director Qian, Teacher Huang of student affairs, Director Gao of educational affairs, Deputy Director Tang, several staff members who had applied for Party membership, and seven members of the school security team—a mighty contingent that headed to the dorm room of the homeroom teacher in charge of Section Three of the class of '82.
The lamps around the dormitory were not functioning; it was pitch-black. Stepping lightly, the group moved so silently that the only sound was their heavy breathing, which they were having trouble keeping in check.
When they reached the darkened room, Wei stopped, turned around, and raised his hand to make sure that no one made any noise. The group stood still, like a grove of breathing trees. Wei curled the index finger of his right hand and tapped gently on the door, as if afraid to startle a child on the other side. Nothing stirred, so Wei craned his neck and whispered, "Teacher Peng, please open the door." As if making a deal with the door frame, he repeated, "Teacher Peng, open the door now."
He waited, and then said, "Teacher Peng, I have a key, and I'll use it if I have to." Still nothing stirred inside. So Wei took out his key and inserted it into the hole, but the door remained shut—it was locked from the inside. Now everyone took a deep breath as Wei retrieved the key and raised his voice. "Smash it!"
He snapped on his flashlight, nailing the wooden door with a blindingly bright light. There was a thump on the other side, followed by the flickering of a fluorescent bulb. Peng opened the door, but he hardly resembled the Section Three homeroom teacher or the people's teacher of dialectical materialism, historical materialism, political economics, and the brief history of social development. Seemingly devoid of human form and skeleton, he looked like a chicken thrown into the pot or a dog fished out of the water.
The separate interrogations began that night. Pang Fenghua refused to talk until three in the morning, when, exhausted from crying, she confessed and took responsibility for everything, as if she were the one who had done all the unspeakable acts. Then she clammed up and resumed crying.
By comparison, the homeroom teacher had a better attitude. After seven or eight cups of boiled water, he responded to every question. But his interrogation was interrupted when he began spitting blood, thanks to the boiling water he'd gulped down.
How careless could someone be? How had he not sensed how hot the water was? And how had he managed to gulp it down like that? He must have been scared out of his wits. Fortunately, he cooperated by telling them everything, including the first kiss, the first embrace and who had initiated it, whose tongue had first entered the other's mouth, whether they had fondled each other and how, and who had begun fondling first and where. He told them everything, sometimes more than once because Wei kept repeating his questions, and Peng had to repeat his answers.
Wei's eyes lit up each time Peng responded, and Wei's skin twitched as if he were in pain or, perhaps, in ecstasy. He seemed to be enjoying himself, but Peng was less forthcoming when it came to sex. He hemmed and hawed, trying to evade the issue. Naturally, Wei would not let him off the hook, and he followed up with tough, carefully crafted questions, not giving Peng a chance to deny anything.
"When did you first go to bed together?" Wei asked.
"We didn't," Peng replied.
"The two of you had to be in bed because everyone saw how the sheets, the blanket, and even the pillows were all rumpled. How can you deny it?"
"We did go to bed, but not like that," Peng insisted.
"Like what then?" Wei was relentless.
"We were in bed, but we didn't do it. Honest, we didn't go to bed like that."
"Oh? What do you mean by 'like that'?"
"I mean sleeping together. We didn't sleep together."
"Who said you were sleeping? If you were, you wouldn't have been able to get up to open the door."
"I don't mean going to sleep. I mean having a relationship."
"What kind of relationship?"
"Between a man and a woman."
"And what is that?" Wei demanded.
"A sexual relationship. You can have her checked at the hospital," Peng said. In order to prove his innocence, he took a small box out of his pocket and opened it to show the contents—condoms, which he counted in front of everyone. There were ten, not one less.
In a burst of anger, Wei banged the table but was stopped by Director Qian, who signaled him with his eyes to keep the proper attitude.
"What does that prove?" Wei thundered. "I ask you, just what do you expect that to prove? Do you mean to say you can't have sex without one of those?"
Peng looked up. That's right. How could he prove he didn't do it by simply showing them that he didn't use the condoms? He couldn't stop blinking. Suddenly he fell to his knees in front of Wei and knocked his head on the floor repeatedly.
"It's true," he pleaded. "I'm not lying. We wanted to, but you showed up before we could do it."
"Did you two talk about it?"
"Yes."
; "Who brought it up?"
Peng thought quietly for a moment before finally saying, "Not me."
"Who then?"
"She did."
"Who is she?" Wei was relentless.
"Pang Fenghua," Peng replied.
Five o'clock Sunday morning. The disappointing news came just before sunrise. The homeroom teacher had gotten away. He'd been guarded by two students of the school security team, but they were, after all, young and inexperienced. They'd dozed off and let the homeroom teacher of Section Three of the class of '82 sneak away right under their noses.
The security team searched everywhere on campus, even the toilets, but he was nowhere to be found. At 6:10 A.M., Wei Xiangdong gave a self-critical report to Director Qian, who quietly heard him out and then, instead of a reprimand, consoled him: "He didn't escape. How could he? He has simply fallen into the vast ocean of the people."
The homeroom teacher "had fallen into the vast ocean of the people." At 10:45, Yuyang heard Director Qian's pronouncement from a classmate. Having never seen an ocean, Yuyang tried hard to imagine what it was like, but by lunchtime she still had not conjured up an image of an ocean. But she was convinced that, generally speaking, it must be vaster than she could envision. It must be infinite and boundless. She was sure of that.
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Notes
Page
[>] Wang Family Village: Many rural villages are populated mainly by families with the same surname.
[>] I definitely am no match [for you]: Here the author is showing how poorly educated Yumi is; she does not write well and her accented Mandarin causes her to choose the wrong words.
[>] Chairman Mao is already attending to state affairs at Tiananmen: This is how country folk might comment that the government is up and running.
[>] started his day with two newspapers and one magazine: People's Daily, PLA Daily, and Red Flag.
[>] her Three Fives alarm clock: A brand of alarm clocks that refers to a somewhat obscure slogan from the 1950s.
[>] an older generation than Director Guo: If Little Tang's son marries Guo's sister-in-law, she would be considered a member of an older generation than Guo's, which would make her feel either awkward or proud.
[>] Mao's "educated youths": Urban high school students and graduates were sent by Mao into the countryside during the Cultural Revolution to learn from the peasants. Their numbers were in the tens of millions.
[>] play hawk catching a chicken: A game resembling tag.
[>] and reach her symbolic Yan'an: Refers to the Long March (1934-35) by Communist forces, which ended at their stronghold in Yan'an.
[>] treated to a cow's cunt at every meal: An expression denoting the ultimate humiliation.
[>] condemned as a rightist: A label forced on individuals who were critical of Mao's disastrous Great Leap Forward in the 1950s.
[>] either the east wind ... or the west wind would prevail: A Maoist slogan that means the East (essentially China) shall prevail over the West (mainly Europe and the U.S.).
[>] "A single spark can turn into a prairie fire": A common phrase often used by Chairman Mao.
[>] the school union stopped being a true union: This is not a union in the style of a workers' organization; the responsibilities at a school are to furnish daily necessities.
[>] Misty Poetry: An avant-garde poetry movement of the 1980s.
[>] 12-9 was barely two weeks away: On December 9, 1935, high school and college students in Peiping (Beijing) staged anti-Japanese protests, which are commemorated by the holiday 12-9.
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BI FEIYU is one of the most respected authors and screenwriters in China today. He was born in 1964 in Xinghua, in the province of Jiangsu. A journalist and poet as well as a novelist, he has been awarded a number of literary prizes, including the prestigious Lu Xun Prize. He co-wrote the film Shanghai Triad, which was directed by the internationally renowned director Zhang Yimou. His first novel is the critically acclaimed Moon Opera.
Jacket design by Alex Camlin
Author photograph © Thomas Langdon
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
www.hmhbooks.com
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