by Yan Lianke
I kicked aside the boards and bricks on the ground, then went out to collect some grass and weeds from the entranceway and carried them back inside. When I went out to collect another bundle, I saw that Hongmei had also collected a large pile. I said, “That’s enough, that’s enough.” She replied, “Let’s pile up more and make it thicker.” We placed a layer of grass on the ground inside the tomb, and on the elevated area where the coffin ordinarily would have been, we put down a pile of dog’s-tail grass to serve as a pillow. Then we should have immediately taken off our clothes and done that thing, the thing that we longed to do day and night, but for some reason neither of us made a move. Instead, we both sat down across from each other on the pile of grass, calmly gazing at one another. The hunger that originally consumed us had disappeared, and at that point we were both very calm.
She asked, “Don’t you love me?”
I replied, “Of course I do.”
She said, “Then why don’t you do something?”
I took her hand and realized that her fingers were as cold as icicles in the middle of winter.
I said, “Your hands are freezing.”
She laughed bitterly.
I said, “Are you scared? You seem really afraid.”
She said, “Aijun, do you think we can really have a successful revolution in Chenggang? And what if the revolution doesn’t succeed? I’m afraid that all of our dreams will come to nothing.”
I said, “Hongmei, don’t worry about the revolution not succeeding; all you need to be concerned about is the possibility that we might lose faith. Because if you have faith, you can forge a needle out of a rod.”
Reassured, she nodded.
“Why don’t you unfasten my buttons?”
Like a small child waiting for an adult to remove her clothes before going to bed, she let me unfasten all of her buttons. After I had removed her clothing, she continued sitting in the area near the entrance to the tomb, where there was more light, using her shirt to cover the area between her legs. She watched as I removed my own shirt and pants. I proceeded methodically, while continuing to admire her naked body. There was a cool, damp smell inside the tomb, which gave her face a faint pale hue, and on her snowy-white body there was a layer of goose bumps. I knew she was cold. Perhaps her heart was cold, and even the corners of her mouth were turning blue. But at that moment the midday sun began to shine into the tomb, enveloping her body like a scarf. I walked over, took the clothing I had just removed, and placed it in that sunny spot. I said, “Hongmei, please sit here.”
She replied, “Aijun, just hold me. I feel faint.”
I quickly picked her up and placed her in that spot of sunlight, as though she were an infant. Wearing only my underwear, I sat down in front of her, then placed her smooth, cool legs on my thighs. We sat there, as the sunlight flowed down from her shoulders, and from the tips of her nipples it splashed over my thighs. That sheet of sunlight made me feel warm and itchy, as though I were wearing wool clothing. At that point it was deathly silent inside the tomb, and the sound of air blowing in through the entrance resembled falling autumn leaves. As the air passed through the sunlight, it sounded like the pitter-patter of water droplets on a hot pan. Her hair was much longer than before and now almost covered her shoulders. A strand of hair was resting on her shoulder and breast, creating a bridge between them. In the sunlight, I saw dust particles hopping along that bridge, after which they were absorbed by the cool shadow next to her breast. There were also some particles that jumped out of that shaded area and returned to the sunlit portion of her shoulder, hopping along as though in search of the end of a ray of sunlight until they finally found her right nipple, which had just been roused from the cold. After her nipple was warmed by the sunlight, it shifted from purplish blue to purplish red.
I was agitated by that warmed nipple and began passionately caressing and sucking it. When the right-hand side of her body was already warmer but the left-hand side was still cool, I lifted her onto my lap, such that her legs extended past my waist. Then I pivoted my body halfway around, so that the sunlight could shine into the space between our chests—so that her chest could get warmed by the sun.
I said, “Are you warmer now?”
She nodded. “Can we get married?”
I pondered for a moment. “No, we can’t.”
She said, “Why not?”
I said, “Because you and I need to join the revolution. We both need to become revolutionaries.”
She bit her lip and didn’t respond.
By that point, her buttocks had been resting on my thighs for a long time, and I was beginning to feel somewhat uncomfortable. She tightened her grip on my neck and squeezed my thighs. Her breasts were rubbing against my chin, and every time she breathed they would brush against my lips. I didn’t suck her nipples, because I knew she wasn’t flirting with me or trying to seduce me. Instead, we were in the process of discussing a deep and momentous issue—we were thoughtfully assessing which was stronger: revolution or love. She looked at me in a state of semi-confusion. Her face, having been warmed up by the sun’s rays, now looked as delicate as before, though it remained shadowed by a mist-like layer of confusion. In the innermost section of the tomb, a water droplet fell from the earthen walls and onto the old coffin stand, like a piece of jade striking a hollow pile of dirt. We turned in the direction of the droplet, then continued embracing each other.
I said, “Do you understand what I’m saying?”
She said, “Yes, I understand. Of course, revolution is more important. From the first year of high school I was a class cadre and a member of the propaganda team, so of course I understand that. I don’t necessarily want for us to really get married, I just want for you to be willing to marry me.”
I said, “I’m certainly willing to marry you. That would be my dream.”
She said, “Really?”
I said, “Yes, Hongmei, really. But right now you’ve cut off the circulation to my thighs.”
She changed her position, and said, “Aijun, when you came to meet me and led me to this tomb, was it merely in order to have me strip and sit here?”
I said, “I wanted to look at you. You have no idea how beautiful and seductive you are!”
She said, “Really?”
I said, “Really. Don’t you know?”
She stood up. Although she was still using her shirt to cover the area between her thighs, her hazily visible long legs resembled a pair of jade columns, their milky-white color making me feel increasingly restless, even frantic and delirious. However, I restrained myself, because I hadn’t yet seen enough of her. She stood in the entrance to the tomb, looking down at her chest and her legs. Then she looked up again, her face shrouded in a gorgeous glow, her smile like sunlight pouring in through an open window.
She asked, “What part of me do you want to look at?”
I replied, “I want to look at all of you.”
At this point, she tossed aside the shirt she had been holding between her legs, and with a shout she proceeded to stand completely naked in front of me. She had a revolutionary’s look of conviction and fearlessness, while in her eyes there was a flicker of pride, even arrogance. “Aijun, you can look at me wherever and however you want. You can look at me from now until sunset, and then from sunset until sunrise, or even until tomorrow or the next day.” She said, “You can stand here and stare at me nonstop for three days and three nights. If we had enough to eat, then we wouldn’t even need to leave this tomb for the rest of our lives. I, Xia Hongmei, will give every hair on my body—from my head to my toes—to a revolutionary, and that revolutionary is you, Gao Aijun!”
I was moved by her pride, and terrified by her nudity. I wanted to say something but found myself momentarily speechless. My words remained caught in my throat, though I myself wasn’t even sure what those words might be. I looked up but saw that the patch of sunlight had shrunk and was retreating back to the opening of the tomb. Because of love and the flames
of revolution, the chill had already faded from our bodies. A potent mixture of revolution and love now filled the tomb. At the same time, the tomb felt cooler than before, and I could see the dried grass outside the entrance swaying in the breeze. On the collar of the shirt Hongmei had tossed aside, I could see that there was a piece of thread glittering in the sunlight. There were many drops of water and specks of dust on the spiderweb in the corner of the tomb. I could see that on the innermost wall of the tomb there was a dappling of green moss, as well as several tiny plants that would never see the light of day. Each of the plants was only about as tall as a finger and had about three wilted leaves that looked as though they would fall off at the slightest touch. Hongmei stood near the tomb’s entrance with her hands on her shoulders, lifting her breasts with her forearms. In this way, the sunlight shone directly onto her voluptuous breasts, making them glitter like gold. It was as though she were endowed with a pair of unimaginably bright silver suns, under which her upper body looked incredibly delicate and well proportioned. Her waist looked so thin that it seemed you could wrap your fingers all the way around it, and her hips exploded outward below it. How was it that when I ran into her that time on the outskirts of town, I hadn’t noticed her thin waist and voluptuous hips? Was it because she was sitting down at the time? My lips were dry and my throat itched as though there were a chicken feather wedged inside it. I swallowed my saliva, bit my lower lip, and struggled to control my racing pulse. I wanted to keep staring at her—to devour her naked body with my eyes. I couldn’t understand how she could have already had a child, because apart from some very faint stretch marks on her smooth belly, you would never have guessed she had given birth. She had supple thighs and long, slender legs, without a trace of extra fat. Her toenails were still red with nail polish, as though she had ten buttons fastened to the ends of her toes. Her toes made her legs appear bright, and her entire body look incandescent. With such an intoxicating body, how could she possibly be an ordinary woman? How could she be just a young woman from the countryside? If not a Buddha appearing in the form of a living woman, then what was she? If not a goddess that heaven had given mankind, then what was she? She had been standing as straight as a rod, but perhaps she had been standing for too long, for she proceeded to turn halfway around, allowing me to view every nook and cranny of her body.
She extended her left leg and leaned over, so her center of gravity was now positioned entirely over her right leg. In this way, that increasingly narrow patch of sunlight happened to shine directly on the triangular area below her belly, illuminating her dark and mysterious pubic region. Each of those soft pubic hairs revealed its persistence and strength of character. It was as if every strand of hair was struggling to stand up and straighten its back and—braving sun and rain—claim a piece of the world for itself. Golden yellow in the sunlight, that area was the size of half a fist, and the tip of every strand of hair glittered with a drop of reddish light. Because most of the sunlight was blocked from entering the tomb, and we had by then become accustomed to the half-light inside the tomb, I noticed that the tomb’s earthen walls looked darker than before; they were now a watery-red color so dark it was nearly black. This blackish-red background made Hongmei appear even more beautifully white—as white as a marble statue of a goddess. I examined her so carefully and for such a long time that it was as though I were reading her like an essay. As I stared at her, I felt I should say something, but I wasn’t sure exactly what. What could I possibly say that could live up to that scene of beauty on display before me?
I said, “Hongmei, believe it or not, it is for you that I am determined to bring the revolution to Chenggang.”
She appeared to grow tired of standing, and shifted her weight to her other leg. The ray of sunlight now illuminated her from behind, as though a piece of glass were hanging over her buttocks. She looked at me and replied, “Gao Aijun, if you can initiate a revolution in Chenggang, I won’t hesitate to die for you and for the revolution.”
I made a fist, gripping so tightly that sweat poured out from between my fingers. I squeezed all of my hunger for revolution into my fist. I said, “Hongmei, I wasn’t able to successfully lead the uprising, so how will I be worthy of the revolution, of this truth for which you have stripped naked and let me gaze at as much as I wish?”
A smile momentarily hovered over her face like a rosy cloud, then she looked down at her red toenails. She bent her knees and pushed out her chest as if she were about to turn around. She positioned her arms in a circle, with her fingers locked and palms facing upward. She didn’t look at me and instead gazed at the wall to her right. She was relaxed, like spring catkins and poplar blossoms drifting in the wind. She resembled a dancer who had just finished a performance, with her pert breasts, trembling nipples, faint stretch marks, her raised posterior with the patch of sunlight visible on it, her tensed-up thigh muscles, together with that patch of hair that became even more mysterious and semi-concealed due to the way she was twisting her torso. She displayed her feminine mystique as though putting a vase of flowers on a table. Sweat poured out from between my fingers, making it necessary for me to continually wipe my hands on my army-issued pants. I felt I had to plug up my sweat-producing pores or else the blood in my veins might follow the sweat and gush out of my body. Outside the tomb, we heard people heading home after work, and it sounded as though they were directly over our heads. The effect of these timely footsteps was like a bucket of cold water being poured over my infatuated body. I noticed that when Hongmei heard the footsteps she turned pale, but as the sound receded into the distance she regained a flowery look of excitement. She gazed at me without saying a word, then suddenly broke the pose she had been holding and proceeded to stand on one leg. With one hand on her waist and the other above her head, she pointed to the ceiling. Because she was holding her breath, her abdomen was sucked in and her posterior was taut. This made her already-slender figure appear even more reedlike, as though a luscious peeled white shallot had been planted in the tomb’s entrance. She proceeded to perform a series of Chinese opera dance routines, “Circling Crane,” “Flying Goose,” “Nesting Sparrow,” “Phoenix Spreading Its Wings,” and “Golden Chicken Changing Legs,” as well as a series of bent-waist, hunched-back, half-turn, and full-turn poses. In quick succession, she performed more than a dozen of these moves. Soon three of her red toenails on her right foot were covered in mud from the ground, and because she kept lifting up her arms, several of her fingernails became dirty with red clay from the ceiling. Once, when she was straightening her back, several pieces of clay fell from the ceiling, sliding into her cleavage and then down her torso—leaving her abdomen looking as though it were covered in pink stars.
By this point the sunlight had receded to the entranceway to the tomb, and the weeds outside were no longer swaying back and forth. Hongmei proceeded to cycle through a series of dance moves and poses inside the tomb, looking completely engrossed. Regardless of how small the tomb was, she continued to cycle through her repertoire, displaying her feminine beauty. At that moment, the fire in my body was calmed by her beauty. She told me there was a culture palace in the county seat, and that she had been studying there ever since she was little. She said she had studied dance with a female instructor whom everyone had called an old hag and a corrupt and degenerate element. She said she also studied Yu opera with a male actor who specialized in singing female roles and who had transferred from the county’s opera troupe to the culture palace. She claimed she was the most talented female opera performer in the entire region surrounding the city, and that she had once been selected by the school principal to perform opera songs and dances for the cadres who had been sent from the district and the provincial capitals to investigate the literacy efforts in the villages. Unfortunately, when it came time for her to go to high school, her father forced her to withdraw so that her elder brother could instead attend high school in the county seat. As a result, her dream of pursuing a career as an opera performer w
as destroyed by her father, who had spent his entire life working as a gatekeeper for the Party secretary and mayor, sweeping the courtyard and preparing tea. She said that if she hadn’t had to withdraw from school, she might have been able to test into the district-level theater school, after which she might have been able to become a professional actor in a district-level or county-level opera troupe. By now, she would probably already have become the daughter-in-law of the county head or the county Party secretary. Had that been the case, she wouldn’t have married into Chenggang and definitely wouldn’t have had to lead this sort of dull life as the wife of a teacher and the daughter-in-law of the former mayor. If she had been able to become an actor in an opera troupe, then what would her life be like now? Would she still have met me that day on the outskirts of town? Would she still have been as passionately invested in political movements and revolution as she now was? Would she still have had silver acupuncture needles pushed into her head and hands? Would she have been willing to strip naked inside this tomb and perform her flying, standing, and leaping routines for me? Of course not. She would be enjoying a completely different fate.
It occurred to me that the reason she was able to approach me with this crazy energy in the tomb was because she had married into Chenggang and into Cheng Tianmin’s family, and because her husband was that milquetoast teacher Cheng Qingdong. But why did she marry into Chenggang? Naturally, it wasn’t to serve as Cheng Qingdong’s wife, to bear and raise the Cheng clan’s children. It wasn’t to become a resident of this old and esteemed community. Instead, she had come to Chenggang to serve as a grave robber, a revolutionary activist and organizer, a successor of Chenggang’s enterprise, a supplement for my unhappy marriage, a revolutionary with whom I could share a pillow, and someone who could serve as my right arm. I was grateful to her and overwhelmed by the remarkable favor she had granted me. At the same time, however, I felt bewildered by the extraordinary circumstances in which I found myself. I was surprised by her sudden appearance at my side and was awed by her loyalty to the revolution. I was embarrassed and delighted by her willingness to offer me her love and affection, and I was astounded by her refreshing ability to express her love at any time and even in unlikely locations. I gazed at her, not wanting to miss a single detail as I watched her shift from one pose to another. I saw how her expression and complexion shifted as her body changed positions. I saw how, when she adopted the flying pose, she looked upward and her face came to have an orange hue, as even her earlobes became as red as a pair of flower pistils. At that point, however, because her chest was relaxed and oriented downward, her breasts came to resemble a pair of red and white peony blossoms swaying back and forth, looking like they might fall onto the mud- and straw-filled floor of the tomb, and I couldn’t help but reach out to grasp and support them. When she adopted the arched-back pose, her breasts nestled into her chest, pulling every wrinkle taut and making every blood vessel visible. But when she bowed her waist, such that her hands almost touched the floor, her lower abdomen and thighs were pulled taut, transforming that area into an endless flatland that seemed to be floating in midair in the middle of the tomb. Perhaps she didn’t realize that she had opened a hidden door, a window to that room that had previously been in perpetual darkness—thereby sending her feminine beauty directly to my eyes. I saw water-soaked butterflies and fish in that secret room. I saw butterflies flying out the window and fish swimming under the door. My body once again became feverish, and my palms became covered in sweat, and my throat felt parched like a desert that hadn’t seen a drop of rain for over three years. I couldn’t control myself, but at the same time I didn’t want to have to continue restraining my desire. I lunged forward and hugged her tight, then proceeded to lie down on the grass mat.