Red Azalea Page 4

  I read to the crowd that Autumn Leaves was the wolf in sheep’s skin. I took out the books she loaned me and showed them to the crowd. As I was delivering my speech, I saw from the corner of my eye that Autumn Leaves had turned her head in my direction. She was murmuring. I became nervous but managed to continue. Comrades, I said, now I understand why Autumn Leaves was so kind to me. She was trying to turn me into an enemy of our country, and a running dog of the imperialists! I read on.

  There was some slogan-shouting, during which I glanced secretly at Autumn Leaves. She was breathing hard and was about to fall. I stood, my limbs turning cold. I tried to remove my eyes from Autumn Leaves, but she caught them. I was terrified when I saw her staring at me without her eyeglasses. Her eyes looked like two Ping-Pong balls that almost popped out of her eye sockets.

  The crowd shouted, Confess! Confess! Autumn Leaves began to speak slowly to the crowd with her hoarse voice. She said that she would never want to turn any of her students into the country’s enemy. She broke into tears. Why would I? she repeated again and again. She was losing her voice. She began to swing her head trying to project her words, but no sound came out. She swung her head again making an effort to let her words out. She said that her father loved this country and that was the reason she came back to teach. Both her father and she believed in education. Spy? What are you talking about? Where did you get this idea? She looked at me.

  If the enemy doesn’t surrender, let’s boil her, fry her and burn her to death! Secretary Chain shouted. The crowd followed, shouting and waving their fists. Secretary Chain signaled for me to go on. But I was trembling too hard to continue. Secretary Chain walked to the microphone from the back of the stage. He took over the microphone. He told the crowd that this was a class enemy’s live performance. It had given us an opportunity to learn how deceitful an enemy could be. Can we allow her to go on like this? No! the crowd shouted.

  Secretary Chain was ordering Autumn Leaves to shut up and accept the criticism of the revolutionary masses with a correct attitude. Autumn Leaves said that she could not accept any untrue facts. Autumn Leaves said that a young girl such as I should not be used by someone with an evil intention.

  You underestimated our Little Red Guard’s political awareness, Secretary Chain said with a scornful laugh. Autumn Leaves demanded to speak to me. Secretary Chain told her to go ahead. He said that as a thoroughgoing dialectical materialist he never underestimated the role of teachers by negative example.

  As the crowd quieted down, Autumn Leaves squatted on her heels to seek her glasses on the floor. When she put her glasses back on, she started to question me. I was scared. I did not expect that she would talk to me so seriously. My terror turned into fury. I wanted to get away. I said, How dare you put me in such a spot to be questioned like a reactionary? You had used me in the past to serve the imperialists; now you want to use me to get away from the criticism? It would be a shame if I lost to you!

  Autumn Leaves called my name and asked if I really believed that she was an enemy of the country. If I did not think so, could I tell her who assigned me to do the speech. She said she wanted the truth. She said Chairman Mao always liked to have children show their honesty. She asked me with the exact same tone she used when she helped me with my homework. Her eyes were demanding me to focus on them. I could not bear looking at her eyes. They had looked at me when the magic of mathematics was explained; they had looked at me when the beautiful Little Mermaid story was told. When I won the first place in the Calculation-with-Abacus Competition, they had looked at me with joy; when I was ill, they had looked at me with sympathy and love. I had not realized the true value of what all this meant to me until I lost it forever that day at the meeting.

  I heard people shouting at me. My head felt like a boiling teapot. Autumn Leaves’ eyes behind the thick glasses now were like gun barrels shooting at me with fire. Just be honest! her hoarse voice raised to its extreme. I turned to Secretary Chain. He nodded at me as if to say, Are you going to lose to an enemy? He was smiling scornfully. Think about the snake, he said.

  Yes, the snake, I remembered. It was a story Mao told in his book. It was about a peasant who found a frozen snake lying in his path on a snowy day. The snake had the most beautiful skin the peasant had ever seen. He felt sorry for her and decided to save her life. He picked up the snake and put her into his jacket to warm her with the heat of his body. Soon the snake woke up and felt hungry. She bit her savior. The peasant died. Our Chairman’s point is, Secretary Chain said as he ended the story, to our enemy, we must be absolutely cruel and merciless.

  I turned to look at the wall-sized portrait of Mao. It was mounted on the back of the stage. The Chairman’s eyes looked like two swinging lanterns. I was reminded of my duty. I must fight against anyone who dared to oppose Mao’s teaching. The shouting of the slogans encouraged me.

  Show us your standpoint—Secretary Chain passed me the microphone. I did not know why I was crying. I heard myself calling for my parents as I took the microphone. I said Mama, Papa, where are you? The crowd waved their angry fists at me and shouted, Down! Down! Down! I was so scared, scared of losing Secretary Chain’s trust, and scared of not being able to denounce Autumn Leaves. Finally, I gathered all my strength and yelled hysterically at Autumn Leaves with tears in my throat: Yes, yes, yes, I do believe that you poisoned me; and I do believe that you are a true enemy! Your dirty tricks will have no more effect on me! If you dare to try them on me again, I’ll shut you up! I’ll use a needle to stitch your lips together!

  I was never forgiven. Even after twenty-some years. After the Revolution was over. It was after my begging for forgiveness, I heard the familiar hoarse voice say, I am very sorry, I don’t remember you. I don’t think I ever had you as my student.

  It was at that meeting I learned the meaning of the word “betrayal” as well as “punishment.” Indeed, I was too young then, yet one is never too young to have vanity. When my parents learned about the meeting from Blooming, Coral and Space Conqueror, they were terrified. They talked about disowning me. My mother said, I am a teacher too. How would you like to have my student do the same to me? She shut me out of the house for six hours. She said being my mother made her ashamed.

  I wrote what my mother asked of me a thousand times. It was an old teaching passed down since Confucius. It said, Do not treat others how you yourself would not like to be treated. My mother demanded I copy it on rice paper using ink and a brush pen. She said, I want to carve this phrase in your mind. You are not my child if you ever disobey this teaching.

  When I was seventeen, life changed to a different world. The school’s vice principal had a talk with me after his talks with many others. He told me that he wanted to remind me that I was a student leader, a model to the graduates. The policy was there, as strict as math equations. He told me that I belonged to one category. The category of becoming a peasant. He said it was an unalterable decision. The policy from Beijing was a holy instruction. It was universally accepted. It was incumbent upon me to obey. He said he had sent four of his own children to work in the countryside. He was very proud of them. He said that twenty million Chinese worked on these farms. He said many more words. Words of abstractions. Words like songs. He said when one challenges heaven, it brings pleasure; when one challenges the earth, it brings pleasure; when one challenges one’s own kind, it brings the biggest pleasure. He was reciting the poem by Mao. He said a true Communist would love to take challenges. She would take it with dignity. I was seventeen. I was inspired. I was eager to devote myself. I was looking forward to hardship.

  I listened to the stories of the neighborhood. My next-door neighbor wrote from his village and said that he had purposely hammered his finger at work in order to claim injury for a chance to be sent back home. Little Coffin’s big sister went to the northern border and wrote that her roommate was shot on the border as a traitor when she tried to escape to the USSR. My cousin who went to Inner Mongolia wrote and said that his clo
se friend died while putting out a mountain fire. He was honored as a hero: he saved the village’s grain storage at the expense of his life. My cousin said the hero made him understand the true meaning of life so he decided to spend the rest of his life on horseback in Mongolia to model himself after the hero.

  Among the gossip, I heard that the Li family’s daughter was raped by a village head in the Southwest province; the Yang family’s son was honored for killing a bear that had eaten his coworker in a forest at a northern farm. These families were upset. They took the horror stories to the local Party administrators. The letters were shown. But the families were told not to believe such monstrous lies. Because it was made up by enemies who feared the revolution spreading. The Party authorities showed the families pictures of the place where their children had gone, pictures of prosperity. The families were convinced and comforted. The family upstairs sent their second and third children to the countryside. Little Coffin’s parents were honored with certificates and red paper flowers, for the family had sent three children to the countryside. Their doors and walls were pasted with big poster-sized letters of congratulation.

  Finally, my name appeared on the school’s Glorious Red List—I was assigned to the Red Fire Farm, which was located near the shore area of the East China Sea. The next day I was ordered to go to a city building to cancel my Shanghai residency.

  It was a cold afternoon. The city building had no lights. The clerks worked in the shadows. It was in the shadows I began my heroic journey. The officer passed me back my family’s resident registration book. I saw my name blotted out by a red stamp. The red stamp, the symbol of authority. That afternoon I felt like a bare egg laid on a rock. Maybe I would come to a real birth or maybe I would be smashed by the paw of some unfamiliar creature. I realized at that moment that it was much too easy to sing “I’ll Go Where Chairman Mao’s Finger Points.” I remembered how I sang that song. I never realized what I was singing until that day.

  I sat in the dark. And my family sat with me. And the day came.

  Part TWO

  On the morning of April 15, 1974, my family accompanied me to the People’s Square. Ten huge trucks were parked in the center of the square. Red flags with characters the color of gold were tied to the side of every truck, proclaiming “Red Fire Farm.” The flags were blown to their full size, bright as the color of fresh blood.

  I registered. A woman of about twenty-five, with short hair cut to the ears and half-moon-shaped eyes, greeted me. She was warm. She introduced herself as Comrade Lu. She said congratulations to me repeatedly and leaned over my shoulder and said, Be proud of yourself! She smiled. The half-moon eyes became quarter moons. She shook hands with me and tied a red paper flower to the front of my blouse. She said, Hey, smiling, we are family now.

  I got on a less crowded truck. My father passed me my suitcases. Mother looked ill. Blooming and Coral went to hold her arms. Space Conqueror stared at me. His deep-set eyes were two wells of chaos. My father waved at me and forced a smile. Now get out of here, he said, trying in vain to be funny.

  My family stood in front of me, as if taking a dull picture. It was a picture of sadness, a picture of never the same. I was out of the picture.

  I wanted to tell my family to leave because the longer they stayed the more bitter I grew. But I was not able to say anything. I was too sad to say anything. But I was seventeen. I had courage. I turned toward the direction where the wind blew. I said to the future, Now I am ready, come and test me!

  When the trucks pulled away, the crowd moaned. Parents would not let loose of their children’s arms. I looked away. I thought of my heroic past, how I had always been proud to be a devoted revolutionary. I forced myself to feel proud, and that way I felt a little better. Comrade Lu saw me, saw that I did not wave goodbye to my family. She came to my side and said, Good guts. She asked us to sing a Mao quotation song. She led: “Go to the countryside, go to the frontier, go to where our country needs us the most …”

  We began to sing with Lu. Our voices were dry and weak like old sick farm cows. Lu waved her arms hard, trying to speed up the singing. People paid no attention to her. It was a moment when memory takes root. The moment youth began to fade. I stared at my parents who stood like frosted eggplants—with heads hanging weakly in front of their chests. My tears welled up. I sang loudly. I screamed. Lu said into my ear, Good guts. Good guts. Her arm was holding the flag of Red Fire Farm. The trucks advanced, facing the blowing wind. The dust blurred, the image of Shanghai faded.

  On the truck no one introduced himself to the others. Everyone sat right next to his luggage, listening to the roaring sound of the wind. We sat, as if mourning. In a few hours we were greeted by the night stars of the sky. I started to miss my father. I thought of the night he dragged me, Blooming, Coral and Space Conqueror out of our beds at midnight to observe the Milky Way and the stars. He wanted us to be astronomers. The dream he had not had a chance to complete himself. It was as clear as tonight, the sky, the Milky Way, Jupiter, Mars, Venus and a man-made earth satellite in orbit …

  It was in drowsiness that I smelled the East China Sea. Lu told us that we had arrived at Red Fire Farm. It was late afternoon. There was an ocean of endless sea reeds. The trucks spread out in different directions. Like a little spider our truck crawled into the green. The sky felt so murky and short. Short like a reachable ceiling.

  I got off the truck with tingling legs. There were two rectangular gray-brick barracks standing on each side of me. Between the barracks there was a long public sink with many taps. I saw people walk in and out of the barracks. People who looked tired, bored, in dusty clothes, with greasy hair. They paid no attention to us.

  I was picking up my suitcases when I heard someone shouting suddenly, Assemble! The commander is coming!

  Commander? Was I in a military camp? Confused, I turned to Lu, who was staring tensely toward the east. Her smile had disappeared completely. She looked hard. I followed her eyes toward the open field. A small figure appeared on the horizon.

  She was tall, well-built, and walked with authority. She wore an old People’s Liberation Army uniform, washed almost white, and gathered at the waist with a three-inch-wide belt. She had two short thick braids. She had a look of a conqueror.

  Stopping about five feet away from us, she smiled. She began to examine us one by one. She had a pair of fiery, intense eyes, in which I saw the energy of a lion. She had weather-beaten skin, thick eyebrows, a bony nose, high cheekbones, a full mouth, in the shape of a water chestnut. She had the shoulders of an ancient warlord, extravagantly broad. She was barefoot. Her sleeves and trousers were rolled halfway up. Her hands rested on her waist. When her eyes focused on mine, I trembled for no reason. She burned me with the sun in her eyes. I felt bare.

  She began to speak. Her words carried no sound. People quieted down and a whisperlike voice was heard. Welcome to you, new soldiers to Red Fire Farm who join us as—she cleared her throat and spit out the words one by one—as our fresh blood. She said she welcomed us to break out of the small world of our personal concerns to be part of an operation on such a grand scale. She said that we had just made our first step of the Long March. Suddenly raising her voice, she said that she wanted to introduce herself. She said, My name is Yan Sheng. Yan, as in discipline; Sheng, as in victory. You can call me Yan. She said she was the Party secretary and commander of this company. A company that was making earth-shaking changes in everything. She lowered her voice again to a whisper. She said she did not really have much to say at an occasion like this. But she did want to say one thing. Then she shouted, Don’t any of you shit on my face! Don’t any of you disappoint the glorious title of “The Advanced Seventh Company,” the model of the entire Red Fire Farm Army! She asked whether she had made her point clear. And we, startled, said, Yes!

  Fanning her hand in front of her nose as if to get rid of some bad smell, she asked did we wish not to be as weak as we were. She repeated her phrase again. She wanted to hear us
say Yes! in the proper manner of a soldier. And we shouted in one enthusiastic voice.

  She said, That’s better, and then smiled. Her smile was affectionate. But it lasted only three seconds. She looked hard again and told us that the farm had thirteen thousand members and our company four hundred. She said that she expected every one of us to function as a screw in a big revolutionary machine. Keep yourself up. Run, run and run, said she, because if you stop, you rust. She wanted us to remember that although we would not be given formal uniforms, we would be trained as real soldiers. She said, I never talk nonsense, never. This phrase of hers stuck in my mind for a long time, for it was expressed in such a roughneck way.

  As if blanketed by shock, no one moved after Yan called us to be dismissed. Lu raised her hand at Yan. And Yan took a step back from the ranks and introduced Lu as her deputy commander.

  Lu said that she had a couple of things to say to the ranks. She marched in front of the ranks. Big smiles piled up on her face before she opened her mouth. With a surgical voice she said that although she was newly transferred to this company, she was an old member of the Communist Party family. She started to recite the history of the Communist Party, beginning with its very first establishment meeting on a small boat near Shanghai. She talked and talked until the sun drew back its last ray and we were covered by the descending fog.

  I was assigned to house number three, occupied by females. My room was about nine by fourteen feet, with four bunk beds. I had seven roommates. The only private space was within the mosquito net that hung from thin bamboo sticks. The floor was packed earth.