Beijing Coma (70 page)

‘Listen to this. Twenty-four Taiwanese tourists were killed in a pleasure boat on Qiandao Lake. Local bandits raided the boat, robbed the tourists of their money, locked them inside a cabin then set fire to the boat to destroy all evidence of their crime. How can people be so evil? . . .’ My mother peels another tangerine and mutters, ‘They’re much cheaper here than in Beijing. The skins are a bit thin, but they’re very sweet.’

My body is slowly contracting. My hair smells like rotting pondweed. The sweat between my toes has evaporated and my dry soles are beginning to crack.

Mosquitoes and moths flitted around the naked light bulb inside the Voice of Democracy broadcast station. Mou Sen and I were sitting outside having a cigarette.

‘Look at all these people,’ Mou Sen said, his eyes sweeping across the Square. ‘As soon as danger strikes, you won’t see them for dust.’

‘You said this Square is our home, and the more guests we have the greater our prestige.’ I glanced at the security office I’d just help set up on the lower terrace. I’d asked Xiao Li and Yu Jin to keep an eye on it. It was right next to Old Fu’s finance office and Mou Sen’s propaganda office. The Voice of Democracy broadcast station was directly below it on the south-east corner of the Monument. The Monument was the nerve centre of our movement. As long as it was securely guarded, we could keep the situation in the Square under control.

‘No, as far as I’m concerned, the moment we entered this Square, we all became homeless,’ Mou Sen said, rubbing his goatee. ‘We have nowhere to go now. Tang Guoxian wants to turn this place into a semi-militarised zone. He’s got guts, but he never takes the time to think things through. His recklessness is more dangerous than all of Wang Fei’s weak-kneed bluster.’

‘The government’s trying to split us up,’ I said, then remembered those nights at Southern University when Mou Sen and I would lie squashed on my bed reading the same book, our faces pressed together. Fortunately, he didn’t have a moustache and goatee back then.

‘Cao Ming’s latest intelligence report says that Li Peng moved into the Zhongnanhai compound yesterday,’ he said, scratching the red mosquito bite on his leg. ‘He’s in the villa Chairman Mao lived in before he died. I suppose he wanted to move closer to the action, so he can oversee the clearing of the Square.’

‘The Beijing Entrepreneurs’ Association has donated boxes of eggs and soap. They’re stacked up over there. The eggs will go off in a couple of days.’ We stubbed out our cigarettes and returned to the tent.

‘The crowds are dwindling and the journalists will want to know why,’ Nuwa said, glancing at Mou Sen as we walked in. ‘Can you come up with an explanation? Someone told me you were planning to leave the Square to go and write a book.’ As Bai Ling’s spokesperson, Nuwa had to deal with a constant stream of questions and requests from the foreign media.

‘So he’s finally going to write his novel, is he?’ I chuckled. ‘We Southern University graduates are such bullshitters!’ The tent reeked of garlic. Someone must have been chewing a raw clove.

‘Mou Sen is the most talented wordsmith in the Square,’ Nuwa said, turning her gaze to him. When she stepped forward, I noticed a small mosquito bite on her inner thigh, but otherwise her legs were smooth and unblemished all the way to her red-lacquered toenails.

‘He should wait until the book’s finished before he starts bragging about it,’ I said. Secretly, I knew that, being such an avid reader, Mou Sen was probably more than capable of writing a novel.

It was past midnight and the broadcasts had come to an end, so the mood in the tent was relatively relaxed.

Wang Fei was sitting next to Bai Ling, staring at his shoes. ‘The reason the crowds have dwindled is that many students have gone to help man the blockades,’ he said, responding to the question Nuwa had asked Mou Sen. ‘The battlefield has shifted to the perimeter of the city. If there are 200,000 soldiers surrounding the city, there must be at least 200,000 students blocking their advance. The Square is now the rear area of our operations.’

‘There must be a mosquito nest in here,’ Tian Yi said, numbering an audio tape and stacking it away. ‘Can someone fetch some more insect repellent incense?’

‘I’ve been bitten to death,’ Mimi mumbled. She was lying on the ground with her eyes closed. I wondered whether she was talking in her sleep.

‘There are a few coils left in that box,’ Mou Sen said. He stood up, casting a dark shadow on the tent’s canvas.

Tian Yi put a tape in the cassette player. The voice of the rock singer Cui Jian sang out: ‘
Let me cry, let me laugh. Let me go wild in the snow
 . . .’ The drumbeat was strong and insistent. In the shadows, Nuwa’s hips began to move back and forth. I stared at her bottom shaking beneath her tight denim skirt for a while, then quickly shifted my gaze to Tian Yi. Earlier that day she’d told me she didn’t approve of Nuwa painting her toenails red.

‘When the soldiers drag us away, I hope you boys will behave like gentlemen and come to our rescue,’ Nuwa said, still swaying her hips. Her lips were always shiny and red. Tian Yi’s lips only turned red after she’d had a shower.

‘We must muster a crowd of a million people and go on a . . .’ Lin Lu muttered as he lay fast asleep on the ground.

‘Go on a what?’ Nuwa sneered. ‘A night tour of Beijing?’ She didn’t like Lin Lu. She found him false and affected.

‘Hey, Dai Wei, your brother just called you on the phone outside the Museum of Chinese History,’ Liu Gang said, walking into the tent. ‘He said he’ll call back in an hour.’

‘How did he know the number?’

‘All the provincial universities call us on that phone when they need to get in touch with us.’ Liu Gang handed me the note he’d scribbled for me and left.

Behind the scent of tangerine blossom in the air, I detect a distant smell of rotting carcasses. Perhaps someone is cleaning the street, and the stench is from the muck in the gutters.

If I were to wake from my coma now, I’d go straight to a library and leaf through all the new books and magazines. No, the first thing I’d do is jump on a bus and visit Wang Fei.

I can hear people speaking in the room downstairs.

‘Are you married?’

‘Am I married, indeed! I’ve got a kid at school!’

The air slides across my face like warm water. When the sun leaves the room this afternoon, I hope the air will become colder and less fluid.

Someone down the corridor opens a window again and shouts, ‘Turn right at the watchtower, then left after the Taitai Oral Liquid poster . . . What? If they won’t give you a refund, just come straight back.’

Then another voice leaks into my brain. ‘All right then, I’ll tell you the truth. I didn’t want to crease my skirt. Are you happy now?’ It’s Tian Yi speaking to me on the bus, the day we first met. The conductress shouts impatiently, the doors close, and the engine splutters as it revs up. It was a very ordinary remark, but as soon as the words left her mouth, I knew I was doomed to fall in love with her.

I imagine walking through the sunlight on the left side of a lane and looking up into the blue sky. As I remember my hair being warmed by the sun, I feel blood rush to my scalp. I like to gaze at the sky when I walk through the streets on a sunny day. It makes me feel giddy. Sometimes, when I look down to see where I’m going, then suddenly look up again, I forget I’m still walking.

How wonderful it feels to walk! When my feet touch the ground, clouds of dust lift into the air. I walk down stone pavements and asphalt roads that are sometimes soft and sometimes hard. I step over high kerbs and low kerbs, and stamp on empty cardboard boxes heaped in the corner of the street. Sometimes I tread on a shard of broken glass that hasn’t yet been crushed into pieces. With one kick, I can make an old plimsoll that’s been lying under a tree fly several metres into the air. I spot a pile of scaffolding rods stacked against a wall. If I climb up it, I’ll be able see the tree’s upper branches stretching into the sky.

By the time the sunlight has shifted onto the floor, my mother comes back from her lunch, smelling of oil and deep-fried fish. ‘The prices keep going up. Even a plate of stir-fried tomato and eggs costs 1.8 yuan now.’

Someone knocks on the door and asks softly, ‘Do you have any matches? . . . Is that your son?’ It’s a woman’s voice.

‘Come in and sit down, won’t you? Are you in the room next door?’

‘Yes. I can’t stay. I’m having trouble with the kerosene stove I bought. It’s a nightmare to light. I’ve gone through a whole box of matches in just two days.’

‘Come on, sit down, just for a minute. Have you had lunch?’

‘I really can’t stay.’ She nevertheless perches on my bed, pulls the sheet flat, then shifts her bottom about until she’s found a comfortable position. ‘Hmm, what a shame,’ she says, sitting still at last. ‘He looks so young. How long has he been like this?’

‘Two years,’ my mother lies. On the train down here, she told the attendant I’d only been in a coma for two months.

‘What happened to him?’ The woman is speaking towards my face. Her breath smells of garlic.

‘He ran into a washing line while trying to cross a road and fell onto the ground.’ My mother has told this story many times. The first time I heard it was in the hospital in Beijing.

‘You mean he became like this just from a fall?’

‘He was running very fast and the metal caught him here – right here.’ I presume my mother is gesturing to her neck. ‘He went flying backwards and landed head first on the concrete pavement . . .’ Her sleeves make a rustling sound.

‘Tss. I see what you mean. Head first, like an upturned leek . . .’

‘What are you here for?’

‘I’ve got tumours in my bladder.’

‘How long have you had them?’

‘Eleven months, almost a year. This is my third time in hospital.’

‘Have you been operated on?’

‘Yes. I’ve had two tumours removed already. I’ve spent over four thousand yuan on hospital fees. I sold all our pigs for this next operation, but only made half of the two thousand yuan I need. The doctor said that if I don’t pay all the money upfront, I’ll have to go home and wait to die.’

‘It must be a complicated operation.’

‘I’ve been here six days. They found strands of blood in my urine. They said I needed to be operated on at once.’

‘Have you got someone to look after you here?’

‘My husband is with me. He’s had to leave all the work in the fields. I’ve told him to go back, but he refuses.’

‘Oh, is he that tall guy who came here this morning? How many children have you got?’

‘Two. They’re both grown up now. My daughter went to Shenzhen three years ago. She works as a hair washer at an expensive salon. She’s sent us more than two thousand yuan already. She even phoned our village leader once and asked to speak to us. I had a conversation with her. It was very strange. It sounded like she was standing right next to me . . .’

The room grows dark. A smell of fried rice travels down the corridor and escapes through my open window. The noises around me become muddled. I feel like I’m lying in the sleeping car of a moving train.

There’s a train in front of me. It appears to be moving, but in fact it hasn’t set off yet. I run as fast as I can, trying to grab hold of a handle. Although I’m aware I’m chasing a stationary object, I know that however fast I run, I will never reach it. My tendons edge towards my skin’s sense receptors, allowing me to gauge the position of my legs and experience a sensation of weariness.

Flocks of sparrows settle on the roof of this hospital which was once a small government-run hotel. The loud chirps are accompanied by a scent of leaves. As the sparrows fall asleep, the mosquitoes fly out of their nests. Last night they covered my face with bites.

Someone in a room at the end of the corridor has put on a tape. ‘
I don’t want to live alone. I want to meet someone new . . .
’ The pop singer has a strong local accent. I haven’t heard her before.

Another song blares from a cassette player in the small shop outside: ‘
If you want to go, go. But don’t come back again . . .
’

When the door of the room at the end of the corridor is opened, probably to let out some of the smoke from the food being cooked on the camp stove inside, the pop song becomes much louder. ‘
This loneliness is unbearable. Marry me tomorrow and take me away . . .
’ It’s already dark enough to turn on the lights. Now that the heat of the day has subsided, everyone is rushing around again, making a lot of noise.

My mother is sitting quietly by my side, reading the newspapers and magazines she borrowed from the woman next door.

The evening is gloomy and damp. Moisture that evaporated during the day soaks back into my quilt, pillow and skin, and condenses onto the bedside table and floor. Everything in the hospital room becomes heavier. My mother and the furniture are sinking down. In fact, the whole building is sinking.

This is how every night begins in this small mountain town.

There’s a horrible grating sound as my mother closes the window. The magazine she tossed onto my bed is slowly splaying its pages. Once the window is closed, the whiff of urine rising from the sheets grows stronger.

My mother walks to the door, bolts it shut, then returns to the chair.