Last Kiss in Tiananmen Square

by Lisa Zhang Wharton

  “I can’t take this anymore! Instead of dying of anger, I would rather die in a battle!” Lao Liu threw away the cigarette butt in his hand, stood up and walked toward the door.

  “Let’s go!” Pumpkin and Marshmallow followed him. Mr. Wang stood up, glanced at his wife and followed.

  “Hay, forward, forward!” Reciting the communist slogan during the Cultural Revolution, Zhang Ping broke open the door and came out. She had covered her disheveled hair by a hat. She had put on a few dabs of make-up on her swollen face without the lipstick. She swept across the yard before everyone realized what had happened. She ran in front of four angry people, dancing and singing. She ran over toward the wounded people along the alley and gave them big hugs.

  “Be tough, comrade! Don’t be moaning! Power comes from the barrels of guns!” Then she ran toward the end of the alley, shouting, “Chairman Mao said that ‘Power comes from the barrels of guns’. Let’s go and fight!”

  She walked toward the crowd on the street, which was throwing stones and pebbles toward a slow moving tank. A soldier wearing a green uniform with a red star on his cap, looking dazed climbed down from the tank. But he quickly went back in the turret and shot from there and sprayed gunfire at people’s feet.

  “Don’t beat up the soldiers, they are our friends!” A loud voice said in the crowd. “Our hero Lei Feng said that ‘Treat your friends like summer’s heat. Treat your enemies like winter’s cold!’”

  A row of bodies fell in front of her after the gunfire.

  She stared at the bloody bodies in front of her and gasped. Then she saw a flash of bright light ahead of the tanks. Two buses that were put up as barricade were just set on fire by people on the street. The beautiful orange light against the night sky suddenly excited her. She jumped, clapping her hands.

  The tanks pushed away the wreckage, moving forward slowly one after another. Besides tanks, there were some military vehicles carrying loudspeakers. They were blaring slogans like “The people’s liberation army loves the capital!” “We love the people of Beijing. Soldiers and people are one!” These lies were emitted into the air over the bloody bodies on the street into the crowd. Angry citizens began throwing stones again toward the tanks.

  Suddenly Zhang Ping remembered the bloody fight more than 20 years ago during the Cultural Revolution where she was protected by the gunfire, and followed her father stepping over bloody bodies and seizing an enemy vehicle on the street.

  “Forward!” She ran toward the tank. She stepped on the dead bodies as though she didn’t see them and soon she fell under the gunfire. She had joined the rest of the bodies without knowing.

  Lao Liu went over and pulled Zhang Ping’s body back to the alley. She was shot three times. Her blood spilled out like running water.

  “Zhang Ping……” Pumpkin threw herself onto Zhang Ping’s body, crying. “Why did you have to die so soon? Why did you have to die so miserably? God, where is the justice?”

  Lao Liu pushed Pumpkin away and carried Zhang Ping’s body on his shoulders. Blood dripped all over his body and face. He soon looked like a butcher, covered in blood. He squeezed his eyes hard and then tried to open them. With Zhang Ping’s weight on his shoulder, Lao Liu walked slowly toward the moving tanks. The dripping blood created a red trail behind him. Pumpkin and Marshmallow followed him as though Lao Liu had magic power. Gun shots could be heard nearby.

  They marched toward the tanks fearlessly. As they nearly reached them, one of the military vehicles stopped. A baby-faced soldier about seventeen years old crawled out of the tank. His eyes were red and swollen like a mad animal.

  “I just…just want to show this to you!” said Lao Liu. He tried to lift up Zhang Ping’s body to the soldier’s face.

  Tears rolled down Lao Liu’s face, dripping down red like blood.

  Silence.

  “Do you know what you are doing?”

  Silence.

  “Do you know that you are in Beijing Tiananmen Square?”

  The soldier shook his head.

  “Do you know in 1949, when the people’s liberation army liberated the city from Guomingdang (Chinese Nationalist Party), no shots were fired on the Tiananmen Square?”

  The soldier shook his head.

  “Do you know you are shooting your own people?”

  “Stop arguing with them!” Another voice in the tank said. Like a robot who reacted without emotion, the young soldier crawled back to the tank turret, started shooting his machine gun and blasted Lao Liu’s head off. His skull broke into pieces and flew high, one of which landed directly on the railing along the street.

  As the frightened Pumpkin and Marshmallow tried to move away from Lao Liu’s body, they saw a middle-aged lady suddenly appear in front of the slow-moving tank. Her short hair was tangled and half-covered her face. She wore a white polyester shirt and brown pants. Her fragile body stood there firmly which showed her determination. While the tank gradually moved toward her, Pumpkin suddenly recognized that she was Lao Liu’s wife, Wu Zheng.

  “What is she doing there? Let’s go and save her. Hey, Wu Zheng, don’t be dumb! Come back!” Pumpkin ran toward her, realizing that she might have seen what had happened to her husband.

  The tank stopped for a moment, and fired a few shots over her head. She stood there as though she had taken root there. A soldier jumped off a truck next to the tank, carrying a pack of rope-like things. As a short stout man, he approached her slowly as though he was afraid of her. When he was two feet away from her, he released the black rope in his hands. It was a two meter long black leather whip. The whip was like a snake dancing in the air and hitting Wu Zheng’s body. She didn’t move and didn’t even look at her torturer. Instead she ran toward him.

  “Give me back my husband!” She cried like a wild animal.

  The whipping continued. Her white blouse was broken into shreds and was full of bloodstains. Then she caught the whip in her hand. She started pulling it. With God’s power in her hands, she got the whip away from the soldier and started whipping him.

  While this was happening, Pumpkin struggled in her husband’s embrace.

  “Let me go! Let me save her!”

  “Are you crazy? You are going to be killed. I’m not going to let you go!” His face touched her face. Their tears mixed together. This was the most intimate act they had ever done.

  Wu Zheng tightened the whip around the soldier’s neck and began strangling him. Cheers came from the crowd.

  “Kill him! Kill the bastard!”

  The tank started rolling and crushed both of them. The angry people moved over toward the tank. They threw the fire torches and gasoline onto the tank. The tank caught fire. It was blazing in the dark and moonless night. Everyone cheered like the ghosts in Dante’s inferno as the two tank drivers were forced out of the tank. They walked toward the angry people. As soon as they were away from the blazing tank, they were in the hands of angry people. They beat them with sticks, metal bars and spit on them.

  “Shall we kill them?”

  “Of course. Why do you speak for the enemy?”

  “They are not our enemies. They don’t even know what they are doing.”

  “What do you mean? They have already killed innocent people. They are criminals.” A middle-aged man went over, pulling at the collar of a student-looking young man as though he wanted to start a fight.

  The two soldiers soon lost consciousness and their now lifeless bodies disintegrated in hundreds of angry hands. Red-eyed people threw parts of their bodies back at the burning tank. They held up their hands with a ‘V’ sign until a spray of bullets from another vehicle gunned down a few of the people.

  Pressing his wife’s body against the ground with his body, Marshmallow protected Pumpkin from the momentary dense gunfire.

  In a while, the tank stopped firing and ran over the wreckage of the burning barricades. They kept moving forward. Some angry people got up, throwing stones and pebbles at the tanks again, which were too insigni
ficant to stop the tanks.

  Pumpkin and Marshmallow got up slowly, once the tanks had passed.

  “Let’s go home,” said Marshmallow.

  Pumpkin stared at him as though she didn’t understand. Her round face was covered with blood and her eyes were bulging out. Under different circumstances, she might be mistaken for a cannibal.

  “It’s dangerous here. Don’t you understand?” Marshmallow pulled her at the chest, shaking.

  She bent down and held onto a dead girl’s body, trying to pick it up.

  “What do you want to do? She is dead!” Marshmallow stood there and found Pumpkin was totally unreasonable. “OK, I’ll help!” He helped to lift the body onto his wife’s back.

  Pumpkin, carrying the body, walked toward the crowd near them.

  “Hey, this way,” yelled Marshmallow, “That’s the wrong way.”

  She didn’t respond. She passed through the bystanders along the street and walked directly toward the moving tank.

  “Hey, please stop her!” Marshmallow ran toward her and grabbed her blouse from behind. But Pumpkin’s will was so strong that she started pulling him forward. Several people came over and stopped them.

  She threw the girl’s body onto the ground, turned toward her husband; falling onto him, crying and vomiting.

  “Let’s go!” He caught her hand and ran toward the alley.

  It was like a death alley. Most of the people there were either dead or wounded. Occasionally one could hear the yelling and moaning of their friends or relatives nearby.

  When Pumpkin and Marshmallow walked into the yard, everyone was busy tending the wounded.

  The yard had temporarily been turned into a hospital. Actually the moaning from people who had been treated without any anesthetic, made the place seem more like a torture g chamber than a hospital. But the makeshift clinic seemed to be working efficiently. A dozen wounded protesters were lying on the concrete floor under blood soaked blankets. A doctor and a nurse, wearing white coats and hats, walked bristly from one patient to another.

  Chapter 20

  Baiyun and Dagong were surprised to find Yumei sitting alone in one of the tents by the monument, singing along with guitar music from a nearby tent. She wore a red sweater, black rayon skirt and red-lip stick. She looked beautiful and clean today except for the dirty athletic shoes on her bare feet.

  She was lying on the pile of blankets like a sleeping beauty.

  “Hey, Yumei. Why are you alone? Where is Longfe?”

  “He went home. He promised his family,” said Yumei, still lying there. Then she rubbed her eyes and sat up. “I’m waiting here to die!” The she pointed at her skirt and said, “See, I have already chosen my death clothes.”

  “Come one. You look like you are trying to get a new boyfriend,” said Baiyun.

  Yumei jumped up and squeezed Baiyun’s neck. “Baiyun, what happened to you? You have really become a mean girl!” Then she looked at Dagong and said, “You must be teaching her.”

  “Me? Don’t you know that I’m a nice man?” said Dagong. Then he suddenly jumped to the back of Yumei and got her arms off Baiyun’s neck. He started twisting Yumei’s arms behind her back.

  Baiyun was stunned to see Dagong and Yumei fighting each other.

  “Comrades, anyone who wants to stay until the last moment can come and pledge with us at the monument.” Longfe said, coming over to gather people.

  “Longfe, why are you here?” Yumei was surprised to see Longfe. “I thought that you were at home with your parents.”

  “I escaped. I couldn’t just let you stay here and hold on to the fort.” Looking at Yumei’s fragile frame, Longfe couldn’t help hugging her.

  “Let’s go!” Longfe waved at Baiyun and Dagong.

  Thousands of students were gathered in front of the monument and had pledged to die for the cause of greater freedom and democracy. They stood by the makeshift tents and raised their right hands.

  “I swear, for the democratic movement and the prosperity of the country, for our motherland not to be overturned by a few conspirators, for our one billion people not to be killed in the white terror, that I am willing to defend Tiananmen, and defend the republic with my young life. Our hands can be broken, our blood can be shed, but we will not lose the People’s Square. We will fight to the end with the last person,” said Longfe. During the movement, he had become a confident leader.

  Baiyun’s eyes were wet. She turned her head toward Dagong. His face was somber but peaceful. Baiyun couldn’t understand that even during such a crucial moment, Dagong could not even show any emotion. He either didn’t care or he was incapable of showing it.

  “Hey, it’s your last chance to have your picture taken.” Li Yan came over with a camera in her hands. She seemed to never run out of energy.

  “I’m here.” Yumei stood next to Baiyun and crossed her arms in front of her chest as though she was a warrior. Baiyun tried her best to follow her.

  “Hey, you guys have to pay beforehand,” said Li Yan like a businesswoman.

  “What? I can’t believe you! Is money more important than your life?” argued Yumei.

  “Well, not necessarily. But if I survive this week, maybe I will become a famous photographer by selling all the valuable photos I took here.” Li Yan shook her big head and smiled.

  “There is still one optimist here,” said Dagong, “why not?” He gave her a 5-yen bill. Then he grabbed Yumei and Baiyun, one on each side of him. He wrapped his arms around the girls tightly with his head slightly tilted toward Baiyun.

  “Ready and smile.” Li Yan raised the camera.

  “Why do we have to smile today? Why do we have to pretend to smile?” said Yumei.

  “Ok,” Li Yan gave in, “Do whatever you want. But you’d better think it over. These could be historical events. Think about the influence your pictures might have.”

  “I’m happy. I will smile,” said Baiyun.

  “I know you will. You have turned into a teenager since the movement started.” Yumei stared at Baiyun in disbelief. Then she turned to Dagong. “Dagong, how about you? I knew you would go home soon and chicken out. I know your generation, experienced but cowardly.”

  “Hey, I’m a six-foot tall man. I can stay calm under any circumstances.”

  As they were arguing, Li Yan clicked the camera.

  “Do it again. I wasn’t ready yet,” shouted Yumei.

  “I assure you that you will look good in my pictures. You are very photogenic,” said Li Yan.

  “How about a photo of just Baiyun and me?” said Dagong. While he and Baiyun snuggled together, Li Yan clicked the shutter.

  “How about a kissing one?” Li Yan asked. Dagong turn his head and first kissed Baiyun on her cheek and then on her lips.

  “Wow. If you go any further, I will have to close my eyes. Stop it there.” The shutter clicked, and Li Yan took this intimate picture.

  It even surprised Baiyun that she had gotten used to display intimacy in public. She thought that she would be more embarrassed but she wasn’t somehow. At this moment of life and death, she had bigger issues to worry about or she just simply didn’t care anymore.

  Yumei fell back down onto the blankets on the ground, crawled over to turn on the tape player. Baiyun and Dagong sat next to her, started singing along to the tape.

  There is a river in the Far East.

  It is called the Yangtze River.

  There is a river in the Far East.

  It is called the yellow river.

  Although I haven’t seen the beauty of Yangtze,

  I often explore the river in my dreams.

  Although I have not heard the roar of the Yellow River,

  I hear it in my dreams.

  “You guys are competing with Hou Degang!” Wenjing strolled over and she was limping. She hunched her shoulders over with her hands in her pockets, even in this warm weather. She still wore a pair of glasses. Her round face narrowed a little after several days of the hunger strike.<
br />
  “Hey, professor, you are still here?” asked Yumei.

  “I’m leaving. I’m not crazy like you guys, staying here forever,” said Wenjing.

  “Yes. You should be at the American embassy now,” said Yumei, teasing her little, “you should go there and kiss their feet to let you out of country.”

  “I’m not going to join the crowd now. I’m going in the next few days when it is not so crowded.”

  “You go! You go! I’m ready to die.” Yumei rolled over and buried her face in the blanket, weeping. “I wish my mother knew I was here and died as a hero.”

  “Yumei, think of it this way. You are a top student in a top university. If you survive, you would be able to contribute to your country more greatly than by being dead.”

  “No. I feel I belong to here. I can’t leave because I have already planted my roots here in the last few weeks,” said Yumei and calmed down a little.

  “I’m not sure I agree with Wenjing.” Dagong joined in and still was as calm as a stone. “I used to think that way. I used to value myself more than our country. But if everyone were like me, we wouldn’t have a movement like this. Now we are on the verge of victory, so why not stay until the end?”

  “Victory? The government has weapons. They’re coming to wipe us out like ants. I don’t think it’s very wise to sacrifice so many brilliant students,” yelled Wenjing as though nobody would listen to her if she didn’t. Her usual pale face was as red as an apple.

  “Really, they’re coming to kill us?” Baiyun finally said something. Her mind was in a state of confusion. On one hand, she wished this demonstration would go on forever so she did have to go back to school, back to studying, or to go back home and face Lao Zheng who seemed always desire her, or to see her father who was turning more into an animal each day. That world seemed so cold and far and far away. She had started to consider the vast Tiananmen Square as her home, the best home she ever had. On the other hand, if staying meant death, she thought she was ready. She wanted to be with her friends, especially Dagong, even though it meant getting run over by tanks.

  “Don’t listen to me. I’m always the pessimist. Death has never frightened me. I’m always ready for it. But the issue is whether it is worthwhile to die,” said Wenjing seriously.