Last Kiss in Tiananmen Square (27 page)

“I see,” then Baiyun looked around, “what is happening there?” Baiyun saw a few people sit around a circle, talking.

“They are talking about Big Li who is in the serious condition.”

“Really?” Baiyun stood up. Her body waved due to the dizziness.

“Baiyun, are you alright?” asked Dagong.

“I’m fine now.” She walked toward the crowd.

“Big Li, Big Li!” She ran toward him.

“Be careful!” said someone.

Bundled up in a thick blanket, Big Li was lying there calmly. His head was covered with thin layer of hair. He had grown a thin mustache and the start of a beard. His face was as gray as dust.

“He has calmed down a lot after I gave him the injection,” said a middle-aged lady sitting next to him, “He has been in and out of the consciousness.”

“What are you going to do with him,” asked Baiyun.

“I called the ambulance two hours ago. I hope it will come soon,” said a young lady.

Baiyun stared at Big Li and really felt sorry for him. Holding his hands hot from the fever, she leaned forward to take a good look at him.

“Big Li, this is Baiyun,” her tears started dripping onto his face.

“Baiyun,” Big Li opened his eyes, “where are you?” he looked around and tried to locate Baiyun.

“I’m here,” she faked a smile on her face.

“Baiyun, thank you for……coming…….coming to see me.”

“I’m so sorry.” Baiyun held his hand and cried.

“If you……survive this…… Would you go to my home and…….tell my……Dad what……had happened?”

“Yes.”

“Keep up the good…….work….. Don’t…….don’t ……give……up,” his head rolled to the side. He lost consciousness again.

Baiyun leaned forward and hugged him. Then the ambulance came and took him away. The bad news came soon after that.

“The dialogue failed again. The government rejected our demands for a Free Press and a Multi-party government. They also refused to acknowledge us for being patriotic,” said a motorcycle messenger.

This part of the square suddenly became quiet. Some stopped arguing about the food. Some stopped playing cards. Some stopped distributing the blankets for the evening. They were all simply petrified.

Someone started singing “The Internationale”, a song for the international workers and the socialists. More followed and soon it spread over the whole Tiananmen Square.

“Arise, the damned of the earth,

Arise, prisoners of hunger,

Reason thunders in its crater,

It is the eruption of the end!

Let's make a blank slate of the past,

Crowds, slaves, arise, arise!

The world is going to change from its base,

We are nothing, let's be everything!

 This is the final struggle

 Let us gather, and tomorrow

 The Internationale

 Will be mankind!”

Sitting against Dagong’s chest, Baiyun could feel his heart beating. The fact he had a wife and a son seemed so trivial now. She felt so fortunate to have met him. She was very much in love with him. How much she wished to hug him and kiss him now. But she knew this was not the time. Through the song “The Internationale”, she felt the solidarity with thousands of people on the square. “Yes, we were determined. We were determined to sacrifice our youth for a new China”. She said to herself then she turned her head and kissed Dagong, perhaps for the last time.

Chapter 17

“I don’t believe that those bastards will fail us! Down with Marshall Law!” Pumpkin’s voice can be heard before she entered the gate to the yard. She stopped at the gate, rolled her bicycle front wheel over the wooden door edge, and then lifted the back of the bicycle over it, which was weighed down by two sacks of wheat flour. On the handle bar, there were two nylon bags full of noodles, bok choy, potatoes and a dead chicken.

“I almost lost my old life in order to get this food. The Marshall Law has been declared, stores have closed and many people have gone home to hide. There are still plenty brave ones on the square,” said Pumpkin sitting on a stool and breathing heavily.

“Hey, you’d better be careful. You could be thrown into jail if you say something wrong,” said Marshmallow, who was sitting on the step by their apartment door, smoking.

“You can’t wait to get rid of me,” Pumpkin snapped back.

“Hi, mother.” Little Pea came out to welcome her mother.

Wearing an apron around her waist, Little Pea was chopping vegetables in the yard on a table by the sink. Their kitchen was only big enough to hold their stove. She put down what she was doing and walked over to help Pumpkin unload the groceries.

“Be careful, don’t let the flour get wet,” said Pumpkin to Marshmallow who lifted the two sacks of flour from the bicycle. The yard floor was full of laundry water.

“Ok, I know, old woman,” said Marshmallow while walking back to their room.

“Where is Yu Gong,” asked Pumpkin.

“He is still in the square and working for the ‘Flying Tiger Brigade’ by zooming around in motorcycles. He sent me back to cook more food so he can distribute it around. Just before I left, they were doing something really crazy,” she resumed her vegetable chopping; “They were puncturing the bus’s tires, so nobody could use them to transport the demonstrators back home.”

“That’s great,” said Pumpkin while wiping her forehead with her sleeve.

“Look at that crazy woman,” said Marshmallow who just came out of their room.

“Mother, why don’t you get some rest? I’ll get the dinner ready in just a few minutes.” Little Pea dropped the chopped bok choy into a frying pan, and then mixed it with some ground pork and scallions.

“No, I want to have some snacks quickly and go to the square.” Pumpkin ran toward their room.

“What can I say?” He sighed. “She just wants to leave me,” said Marshmallow.

“Hey, old man, we have been married for thirty years. You have never cared about me so much before. What has happened?” said Pumpkin with one of her feet already stepping into their room.

Marshmallow stood up and walked over toward Pumpkin. He suddenly pulled at her shirt collar.

“Old woman, it is dangerous there. Don’t you know that?” His voice was low but firm. One could tell that it directly came from his heart.

Pumpkin was stunned. She was silent for a while. “Ok, I will be careful. But I have to go and take a look.”

“Okay, but let me go with you,” Marshmallow followed her.

“Don’t follow me like a shadow. If you really want to go with me, you’d better prepare to do something.” She stood arms akimbo like a woman warrior. “I don’t want to just go and watch which direction the wind blows.” She waved her arms.

“You want to poke holes in bus tires like those kids? Don’t you care about your own life? Let me tell you that it is against the law to damage public property. There are video cameras everywhere on the square. It will haunt you after the fact.” Marshmallow’s voice was unusually high. Unlike his usual easy going self, his face was livid. His head tilted to one side as though he was trying to make a point. Occasionally saliva sprayed out of his mouths as he spoke.

“Let her go. They may well be successful,” said Lao Liu, the policeman while still looking at the plant in his hands. He was holding a small branch freshly cut from a rose bush. He put the branch into a pot and started pouring sand into it. He was pouring so slowly as though he was counting the sand grains as they fell into the pot. Since the movement had started, he became a full time gardener. He had moved all his roses from pots to the ground in the yard. The red, yellow, purple, pink and even green roses bloomed better than ever. He even built a wooden fence for them.

“Really, do you have any insider knowledge?” asked Marshmallow. He immediately turned back from the gate.

“No. I haven’t been at work for three weeks. I don’t know what is going on. I have been sick, which was the best way I could help the students.” He raised his head, a pair of small-framed reading glassed hanging on his nose. “Now I have a feeling that the situation might be dicey, hard to predict. The scale of the movement has surprised me.”

Marshmallow nodded and then turned around. He found his wife was gone. “That woman!” He quickly went out of the door. Lao Liu resumed his work. Then Mr. Wang’s black cat sauntered over and sniffed at the flow pot.

“The weather will be changing!” Mr. Wang strolled out of the door with a pipe in his hand. Lao Liu smiled and didn’t respond. Mr. Wang stepped down one step and sat down without looking. He stared straight ahead, his face was serious and his eyes unlinked. He seemed to be meditating.

Mrs. Wang came out of the door with a chamber pot in one hand, pushing the door closed with the other. Her four boys were pushing behind the door and trying hard to get out. They were like birds eager to get out of the cage.

“God damn, don’t try to sneak out,” said Mrs. Wang. She stood against the door firmly. Then with an extra push, she locked it.

“Don’t keep telling people about the changing weather. It just rained and it is not raining now. So what’s new?” Mrs. Wang asked. Still sitting, Mr. Wang didn’t say a word. Mrs. Wang walked to the water tap in the middle of the yard and poured the urine into the drain. She turned on the tap and let water run for a while. The water splashed onto her folded-up pants despite her efforts to stay as far as she could from the drain. The water was dripping from the roof that collected from the rain. It sounded very crisp.

“My roof leaked during the rain. I hope there is no more heavy rain before I can get my roof fixed. How about your roof, Lao Liu?”

“Mine is getting better. It leaks at the corner. I managed to glue a piece of plastic onto the roof since the repairman never showed up,” said Lao Liu while concentrating on trimming more rosebush cutoffs.

“I see that you are lucky. My leak was pretty big. I have to put a pail under it to collect the water. I guess this rain may be good for your roses. But for me it’s trouble.” Mrs. Wang started rubbing clothes on a washboard in a basin. The bubbles jumped out of the basin like snowflakes.

“This previous one was OK. But a heavy one could be very damaging. Before, when these roses were still in pots, I could move them in when it rained heavily. But now I can do nothing since I planted them permanently in the ground so they can grow more freely. But freedom always involves risk. I hope the students understand that.”

“Is that what they want, freedom?” asked Mrs. Wang while still beating the laundry.

“Yes, young people want to be free to do things and say things.”

“That sounds ridiculous. A country is like a family. Without rules and laws, even a family can’t run smoothly,” said Mrs. Wang seriously.

“The storm is coming. The seagulls are still fighting in the sky!” Mr. Wang shouted passionately as though he was acting in a play.

“You old man, stop. Don’t disturb our normal conversation,” said Mrs. Wang.

Like suddenly being shocked with electricity, Mr. Wang jumped up. Slapping his knees with one hand, he raised the other, pointing to the door with the pipe. “You goddamn woman, get out of here. Don’t stay so close to me. Go!”

“Ok, I go. You can take care of the kids. You can cook. You can do these too.” She pushed the basin full of soapy clothes toward him. Because of the wet floor, the basin slid toward him in such a great speed that it almost spilled all over him. As Mrs. Wang walked away, the boys suddenly broke the door open and dashed into different directions.

“For heaven’s sake!” Mrs. Wang turned around and started chasing them along the corridor like chasing escaped chickens.

Little Pea and Yu Gang sat in front of a table by their door, rolling out the dough, knead it into a long rope, cutting them into small round disks, roll them into the small round skin, putting the meat in the center and closing them by gathering up all the edges to the center to make steam bread.

“It’s finally quiet here. I can’t believe that it was completely different just minutes ago. Without mom and dad, don’t you feel strange?” said Little Pea.

“No, I don’t think so. This is the way we ought to live,” said Yu Gang quietly.

“Don’t be dreaming. Look at outside. Troops are coming to town. Who knows what the outcome will be. Maybe we will go back to the ‘Cultural Revolution’. We may never be able to own our apartment.”

“Maybe you are right. If this movement drags on, I’m beginning to miss my job. I really want to go back to work.”

Little Pea didn’t answer. Although she was not a slogan shouter by nature, she sort of liked the movement. First of all, her mother Pumpkin became much nicer and generous. She had turned into an excitable and happy mom from a loud complainer. Life for her had turned into a joy and adventure instead of tedious and routine. She and Yu Gang had a chance to run from one side of the Tiananmen Square to the other, shouting and singing along with others. She learned how to dance Disco and sing modern songs. After standing behind the food stand for days, for the first time in her life she realized that she could not only feed people but also make them laugh. She had changed too from a shy and quiet girl to a mature and outgoing lady. She even could argue with Yu Gang loudly, no more submissive little girlfriend. Actually, she thought Yu Gang liked her better this way. This had never happened even during the peak of their relationship. Through her education and upbringing, she believed that steady hard work brought happiness at the end. In the last few weeks, she had more fun than she ever had in her life. Besides distributing the steamed pork buns to the demonstrators, she also sang and danced. What would all this bring her? At work, if she worked hard, she would be elected as a worker’s hero in the past; now she would be rewarded with a bonus. What would the demonstration bring her, freedom? All she knew was that people still needed to eat and stay in a shelter in a free world. She was not even sure that all the students understood what they were doing. Some of them seemed enjoying being there, staying away from their school and families. They were still kids.