China's Son (11 page)

On the ninth day of the ninth month of 1976, Chairman Mao died like an ordinary man. Superstitious farmers said nine was the number of an emperor and heaven had intended that he die like an emperor. It could have been a coincidence, but the sun, covered by clouds, didn't shine over Yellow Stone for ten days following his death. Rumor had it that it was mourning the loss of a great leader, but Dad thought the sky was upset because Mao hadn't died earlier. But a leader, no matter how rotten, was almost a supernatural figure. Confucianism had taught people to be obedient to the emperor unconditionally. Mao's rule had reinforced such a tradition. For days after his death, people gathered in knots, in the fields, under the trees, whispering quietly and mysteriously as though a disaster were about to befall the whole nation.

Mom and Dad told me to be especially careful about what I said.

We, the enemies of Mao, should not appear to be gleeful about the news.

The leaders of the commune could thrash every one of us before the system changed. We could be easy targets for their wrath in mourning. There might be martial law, even civil war, Dad cautioned.

Even though my parents' generation hated him, I had embraced Chairman Mao in my own way. I didn't know any better. A cult mentality had already been forged in me. In my heart, there was no other leader who mattered as much, regardless of how good or bad he was. I had been told not to analyze him because he was wiser, no, the wisest. I was to follow him and love him with all my heart.

Leaders and cadres of Yellow Stone commune held long meetings, during which some were said to have cried until they collapsed. There was a sense that they had lived their golden days and that what might be ahead was totally unknown.

In the street, people wore black bands on their right arms. Day and night, the gloomy and weeping sounds of Mao's funeral music haunted every dusty corner of Yellow Stone, transmitted through temporary loudspeakers. It never stopped.

As though the rift between the Red families and the landlords' families were widened by the death of Mao, I was told by the school authorities not to attend the funeral ceremony. Landlords' families were not invited. I was saddened, humiliated, confused. I had thought I was slowly blending into the system after changing schools. Now they told me I couldn't go and mourn the most forbidding leader, the only leader, I knew. It hurt me deeply to be separated from such an event.
I wanted to say good-bye to him, the dead Chairman Mao, but I didn't even have a black armband.

One day sometime later, on my way home from school, I saw a large crowd gathered at the market square. A young man with a large brush was splashing characters on a white wall that read,
DOWN WITH THE GANG OF FOUR!
Who were the Gang of Four? I stood closer at the edge of the crowd, watching. The young man wrote the names one after another, to the total surprise of all.

Jiang Qing (formerly known as Madam Mao), Yiao, Zhang, and Wang.

It couldn't be. How could Mao's wife be down while Mao's bones were still warm? Mao's wife had been running the country since Mao had been sick.
Someone is taking over the government,
I thought with alarm. Maybe there would be a war, as Dad had said. I rushed home and breathlessly told Dad the news.

“Are you sure?” he asked. “They could throw you in jail if you spread untrue rumors.”

I told him I hadn't made it up. He grabbed Mom and closed the door behind them. I could hear them whispering and laughing.

That evening the bikers, who spent their days carrying passengers back and forth from the city of Putien and Yellow Stone for thirty fen each trip, confirmed the breaking news. They said people were painting the names of the Gang of Four on the cement streets in Putien and then crossing them out. Some even made effigies and burned them. At nine o'clock that night, through a crackling radio system, there was a special announcement from the central government
confirming the downfall of the Gang, which had consisted of some leading figures in Mao's cabinet.

On my way back from school one day, I saw a large crowd standing outside the house that belonged to the party chief of Yellow Stone commune. I could hear a boy sobbing amid the chatter. I stopped, jumped on a vegetable peddler's stool, and strained to see what was happening. Two cops were brushing glue on the front door of the house and pasting white paper over it. They were sealing the house, as they had done to those of the landlords and counterrevolutionaries just a few years ago. And the chief 's son was wiping his eyes with his sleeves, standing obediently by a bicycle packed with his belongings.

I asked an old man standing next to me what was going on. He said they had gone to arrest the chief that day, only to find that he had escaped early in the morning, leaving his son behind. And now they were sealing his house and sending his son away to his grandpa, who lived in the mountains.

Well,
I thought,
the chief, the formidable chief, is now a criminal fugitive and he has abandoned his son.
I still remembered that it was he who had spat at me in the school hallway and plotted with my teacher, La Shan, to kick me out of school in third grade. I didn't think he ever thought this would happen to him. I thought about La Shan, secretly hoping that he might end up being hunted like the party chief, with whom he had tried so hard to ingratiate himself.

Dad wasn't surprised to hear the news. He said that soon we would be able to do what others could do—like going to school and finding a job. I nodded in disbelief as Dad kept saying, “Son, you could be the lucky one.”

In school, I was getting by with the help of others. I had become everything I was not in elementary school, popular with friends, with nobody picking on me. But teachers
looked at me as if I didn't belong there. I was behind in all the subjects. They didn't try to help me. They generally left me alone, and I was forgotten. They thought I was the rotten type that they had to cut off, so they never inquired about my homework and never asked me questions in class. They knew I hadn't prepared for it. I was always with I-Fei, leaving early to rehearsals or coming back late from them. It was a wonderful feeling for a while, because now I had finally become what I had wished to be and could not be in elementary school. There were no enemies chasing me at every corner, concocting dirty tricks behind my back every day. I was respected and had a lot of friends, significant friends. I was my own master. I did not have to fear, worry, or fight. I felt safe and anchored.

But soon I was feeling empty about school. I used to love studying and had known the joy of being at the top of the class. I knew about basking in affirming smiles from the teachers, people my family had taught me to respect. Though I was having a good time, I felt as if I was violating something special.

In class, serious teachers began to talk about the possibility of restoring our country's college system. During the Cultural Revolution, all colleges either were closed, or they enrolled only a small number of students from politically correct families through a corrupt system of selection. The teachers would end their speeches by saying that even the musicians had to pass other tests to go to art school. They would cast a look my way.

The more they talked about college, the more I was determined that I wanted to be an artist, because I was doing so badly in school. I was sure I was beyond hope, academically speaking. I had to do something with my life.

One day that winter, Mo Gong ran breathlessly to our home and told me that our county's performing troupe was holding public auditions for actors and instrument players. I was so excited that the next day I-Fei and I rode his bike and headed for Putien so that I could sign up for the audition. During the next few days, Dad dug out some old music scores, traditional classics that had been banned for the past twenty years, and said, “The Red Guard music is over. Pick one of these for your audition.” He understood my feelings and appreciated my passion for art. After all, it was he who had inspired me.

His friends had only to make the slightest demand and he would nudge me into playing a few songs on my violin, which his friends mysteriously called “the Western instrument.” He would introduce the violin, explaining the relationship between the four strings, and show off the amazing range of the tiny instrument by plucking the strings with his fingers. Sometimes he would ask me to tag along on his occasional gigs playing classic Chinese folk music for weddings, which probably made me the first to render the thousandyear-old melodies on such an instrument. At those gigs, traditional instruments—gongs, drums, and flutes—usually drowned out my tiny violin.

Soong had warned me of the temptation to play everything on the violin. Being a purist, he had asked me how I could play that stupid traditional music on something on which so many magnificent masterpieces had been played. He said it would ruin my style, but I had ignored him. I wanted to make Dad happy.

Since the classic romantic plays were coming back into fashion as Dad had foretold, I concentrated on my flute, not the Western instrument, for the audition. For three days, I practiced only three short classical pieces while Dad listened
and coached. On the day of my audition, my sister Si carried me on the bike to Putien at sunrise, where we waited in a long line of self-proclaimed artists, eating our packed breakfast of cold and dried yams.

My teeth kept clicking as the line began to move. I had to run to the smelly bathroom every five minutes for a twosecond pee. Si saw how nervous I was and said that I was still very young and that if I failed this time, I could always try again. I thought about my friends and about I-Fei. If they had been here, they would have lit a good cigarette for me, kicked me in the butt, and tried to make me smile. I yearned for a cigarette, but the thought of having a coughing fit during the performance stopped the terrible urge.

When I heard my number called, my sister patted my back, and I walked slowly into the hall. It was an old, small theater. As I walked, my footsteps echoed. Before me sat six of the most prominent musical figures in our county.

Teacher Dong, a big fish stranded in a small town, was the only college graduate with a music major from Fuzhou Music Conservatory. He wore his glasses on the tip of his nose and looked at me without an ounce of interest in his drooping eyes. Ding, the famous Putien opera singer, was filing her nails. Flutist Min, the first flute of the county, was slumped low in his armchair. Drummer Jia was reading an old newspaper, and Director Liao, a bearded man, smoked a pipe, fighting the numbing boredom without much success.

I felt small and unworthy.

“What will you do?” Flutist Min asked. “Not another flutist again?”

I hoped he was joking.

“ ‘A Trip to Gu Su,' ” I mumbled. My teeth were still chattering.

All I could think of was my sister's worried look as I left her, the fetid public bathroom, and the sagging eyes of the music teacher. I forced the first sound out of my old flute. The flute sounded as if it was crackling and getting dry, so I started again. It was a steep uphill ride. I couldn't breathe at all. My heart pounded like a rat in an iron cage.

From the corner of my eye, I saw an uncomfortable twitching of Flutist Min's nose. He must be so disgusted. I was sure I had ruined it with the first note. Gradually, I forced my eyes to close and tried to think of the peaceful Dong Jing River by which I had practiced every morning, the green fields that stretched beyond it, and the colors of the mountain at sunrise. Soon the desire to win started to churn within me. I remembered every twist and turn Dad had taught me during the last three days. When the final note had faded away, I opened my eyes to see that all the judges were making busy notes.

Flutist Min was the first to look up. He smiled at me and said, “Well done. It didn't start out right, but you handled the piece unusually well. Come here. Let me have a word with you.”

I walked over to Min's chair.

“Here, let me tell you the truth about this audition. We have enough flutists already. Do you play any other instrument?”

“The violin.”

“No good. We are going back to the old things now— you know, the sort of stuff banned by the Gang of Four. If you are serious about our troupe, try out as an actor. Have you acted before?”

“Not really.”

“Go home and make up your mind about your career.
This is not just for amusement. You need to think and talk to your parents, put your heart into it. If you are still interested, I'll be happy to talk to you. But no instruments. We only need good actors who have the classic looks to perform all those classic plays. Got that?”

I thanked him and left the hall.

My sister was smiling at me, waiting. She said I did a good job. I told her about the conversation I had had with the flutist.

I was quiet during the ride back. I wasn't going to be an artist, nor a carpenter, nor a shoemaker. Definitely not a farmer. For a while I was lost. Time had changed everything for me, and I was always behind, it seemed, like chasing my own shadow. What had once been right wasn't right anymore. I wished I knew the future, while hoping that the past would not be repeated.