by Bi Feiyu
He was audacious, presumptuous, and willful, and yet he sounded so urgent and insistent, as if he could summon up such things at will. Just listen, and imagine him pointing with his left hand.
You
12-9
Are a torch
Then he points with his right hand.
You
12-9
Are a bugle
Who else but Chu Tian could use "you" in such a heroic and carefree manner, and make it sound so spontaneous and ingenious? And what did he mean by "You're sonorous / You're aflame"? That was magical, inconceivable. The lack of punctuation only increased the singular quality of his poetry.
She had heard that an elderly teacher had once questioned Chu Tian about the lack of punctuation. He had replied with only a sneer, turning the teacher's face so red that it looked as if it were about to explode. When the teacher proctored an exam, he kept a close check on Chu Tian, hoping to catch him cheating so he could give him a warning.
But Chu Tian did not need to cheat, for he excelled in every subject except physical education. He was part of the landscape—someone of interest at the school, coming and going alone, ignoring everyone. No one meant a thing to him, not even Director Qian. With her own eyes Yuyang had seen Chu Tian walk past the director, head held high as he refused to acknowledge the man's existence. And yet, the famous and intractable Chu Tian actually spoke to her; in fact, it was he who started the conversation. She was sure that no one would believe her.
It was noon. Yuyang stood at the magazine rack, holding Poetry Journal in one hand and picking her nose with the other. Chu Tian was standing beside her, staring at her intensely. She looked up, saw him, and dropped the magazine. He bent down, picked it up, and handed it back to her.
With a cordial smile that had no hint of superiority, he asked, "Like poetry?"
Finding it impossible that he would actually be talking to her, Yuyang turned to see if someone was standing behind her before she responded with a nod. He smiled again. His teeth were uneven and discolored, but at that moment they seemed bright and sparkling. She wished that she could smooth her hair, but it was too late, for he'd already floated away. Yuyang stared until Chu Tian disappeared behind a door before realizing that her face was burning hot and her unreasonable heart was pounding wildly. This is none of your business, heart.
She stood there, savoring what had just happened, asking herself over and over, "Like poetry?" Her mind refused to concentrate, and when she returned to her seat, she picked up her pen and began to doodle.
Like poetry
Yes
Like poetry
Yes
Like poetry
Yes
Like poetry
Yes
Like poetry
Yes I do
Like poetry
Yes yes I do
She looked down at her notebook, shocked to see that she was writing poetry. This was poetry. What else could it be? Sadly, she realized that she had been a poet all along. What a pleasant surprise—she was already a poet.
The new poet sat in her seat with a blank look on her face, but she could feel her heart flutter as she recited silently.
You—Chu Tian
Are a torch
You—Chu Tian
Are a bugle
You're sonorous
You're aflame
She was amazed when she finally recovered her senses. She remained motionless while the wind blew wildly against the branches outside.
Once you meet someone, it seems that you're always running into each other. That is exactly what happened to Yuyang and Chu Tian. They ran into each other over and over—in the cafeteria, on the athletic field, and, of course, in the library. But mostly it happened when they were headed somewhere. It was invariably accidental, but to Yuyang, the repeated encounters began to take on a special meaning and became a secret that she buried deep in her heart. Girls of her age are good at keeping secrets; they keep a tidy record of neatly categorized secrets in a corner known only to themselves, with a tender wish for two hearts to beat in unison. Like I'm a part of you and you're a part of me.
To Yuyang, the campus seemed to have shrunk now that it felt as if there were only the two of them. Life on campus had a miniature quality that enabled her to manipulate it. For instance, she might be walking along on campus when she'd have a sudden premonition that she would run into Chu Tian. So she'd turn or look around and there he'd be.
There was even an extreme example. One day when she was in her dorm room, she was suddenly restless and felt an urge to go out for a walk. She went downstairs and had barely taken a dozen steps before—there he was again. He wasn't looking at her, but she was overwhelmed, yes, overwhelmed, nearly to the point of tears. She was positive that heaven was on her side, secretly helping her; otherwise, how could such coincidences take place? Chu Tian was intentionally keeping his eyes averted, which had to mean that he was thinking about her. She knew she wasn't pretty, but he was a poet, and poets have tastes that cannot be judged by ordinary standards. His attitude toward her only confirmed the fact that he was different from everyone else.
Every encounter felt blissful to her and constituted a moment of sheer joy. The feeling could even be characterized as intoxication, though that is an uncommonly vile thing that always stands in opposition to you. Intoxication is invariably brief and disappears before you know it. Then comes the endless, bottomless waiting while you yearn for it to happen again, like an addict.
And so intoxication is a void, a boundless entanglement and a lingering that accompanies a sense of loss and heartache, as well as an unending anticipation and waiting. Intoxication is essentially a different kind of suffering, a dull torture.
But for Yuyang defeat was nullified by patience, and even more by a sense of excitement.
She asked herself what was happening to her. It took a long time, but she finally realized that what she felt for Chu Tian was, simply stated, tender affection. She was attracted by his chicken-feather hair, his solitude, his knitted brows, and the way he walked. Everything about him demanded that someone bestow tender affection on him and cherish him. Yuyang knew she was the only one who could do that. If a rock were to fall from the sky and threaten Chu Tian, she would shield him with her body. She wished she could find a way to let him know that she was prepared to stop at nothing to make sure nothing happened to him.
Yuyang had never thought that she could be so daring, that she could act improperly, shamefully even. Where had she found the courage to be so bold? On this particular evening, she followed Chu Tian with her eyes until he entered the library. Then, after hesitating in the doorway for a moment, she walked in and found him seated on a bench in the reading room. Sitting down next to him, she took out a book and pretended to be engrossed in it. It did not matter what she was reading; what mattered was the reality that she was sitting beside him, shoulder to shoulder.
Since they were in the library, no one could spot anything unusual, especially because she sat with her eyes lowered, as if everything were perfectly normal. But her face burned red the whole time, and that made her very unhappy. Whoever said "The eyes are the window to the soul" was an idiot. For a person in love, it is the face, not the eyes, that is the window to the soul. Her window was bright red, as if the character for happiness had been painted on her face. How could she hide her feelings from anyone? She couldn't. Chu Tian turned his head when she gave a dry cough. She knew he'd done that, which instantly changed everything in her—body and soul. Her heart skipped a beat before it began to sink, darkly and slowly, to an indescribable place, while her body turned strangely light and drifted upward.
The air in the reading room compressed, yet the light felt moist as it caressed and gently stroked her. She felt like crying, but not out of sadness. No, she wasn't sad; she just wanted to cry and cry until her body fell apart, which was the only way she could explain how she felt inside. But she composed herself, then took out from her bag the brand-new
hardbound notebook that she'd recently bought. Opening it to the first page, she began to copy in neat handwriting the poem Chu Tian had posted on the bulletin board.
You
12-9
Are a torch
You
12-9
Are a bugle
You're sonorous
You're aflame
She added a dash and his real name, Gao Honghai, and conferred on his name the sort of significance one associates with names like Gorky, Shakespeare, and Balzac. Unsure if the "Hong" in his name was the character for "red" or for "flood," she eventually settled on the latter since it was more common for a boy to have "flood" in his name. After finishing the task, she wrote her name in the lower right-hand corner of the cover followed by, after a moment's reflection, her year and class, as well as her dorm room number. Originally she'd thought she'd be nervous, but she wasn't and, in fact, was uncharacteristically calm. With a somber look, she pushed the notebook away from her before getting up and walking out. It was at that moment, when she was leaving the library, that a panicky feeling began to spread through her body, all the way to her fingertips. But there was nothing she could do about that now, so she ignored it.
Two days later Chu Tian returned the notebook to her—in the library, of course. He didn't even try to be discreet; instead, he walked up and set it down in front of her. No one noticed. She opened it to see his autograph. She'd been wrong; it was "red," not "flood." As she hurriedly shut the notebook, a mysterious door in her heart was broken open, and in rushed a flood of unreasonable things. Scared and nervous, she felt she might faint then and there. I must be in love, she thought, this has to be love.
She was in love—Yuyang was sure of it. After that secret exchange, her chest always tightened when she ran into Chu Tian, while he, too, appeared awkward, tossing his hair repeatedly to fling it off of his forehead. That was totally unnecessary. Why are you tossing your hair? Yuyang wondered. You don't have to do that; your hair will never be too messy for me. Will you still be Chu Tian if your hair is neat? He didn't have to do that, and she'd tell him so when she got a chance.
Yuyang might not have been articulate, but she wasn't stupid. She quickly figured out his daily routine, including his tendency to stroll along the athletic track at least once a day, usually after morning calisthenics or before the evening study period. With fewer people at those times, the field was more spacious, a perfect place for a poet's solitary walk and an ideal spot for the pursuit of romance.
Twelve minutes before the study period began one evening, Yuyang finally mustered the courage and pretended to go for a walk, arriving at the field only to find it empty. Puzzled, she looked around, convinced that she'd seen him head this way after dinner. Where could he have gone?
Undaunted, she tiptoed around behind the cement bleachers, where she spotted Chu Tian, which sent her heart into a frenzy of pounding. Standing alone in the weeds, he was not composing a poem; no, he was standing with his legs spread as he aimed a stream of urine at a tree, straining to send the liquid pillar as high as his head. In order to reach new heights in his urinary endeavor, he pushed with his buttocks and dug in his toes for leverage. Yuyang's mouth fell open. She was shocked by the discovery that the solitary Chu Tian, the proud and unrestrained poet, would be secretly engaged in such sordid, despicable behavior. She stood still, not daring to make a sound, until she managed to turn around and flee. When she reached the entrance to the field, she turned to look behind her. Chu Tian emerged and froze like a pole nailed to the track, apparently knowing that she'd witnessed his disgusting act. They could not see each other's eyes, but they were obviously looking at each other. The ideal image of her poet was shattered; her heart crumbled. As the evening deepened, a dusky color built up between Yuyang and Chu Tian, blurring their outlines and carrying them farther and farther apart. Bracing herself by resting her hand on an iron gate, Yuyang took in big gulps of air as tears roiled in her eyes.
Yuyang fell out of love. But that had no effect on her classmates, who put on an outstanding performance at the singing contest. In fact, Section Three of the class of '82 had a great deal to be proud of. Whether they won or not was secondary; what mattered most was the unprecedented solidarity among the students who formed a combat-ready bloc. Under the centralized leadership of the homeroom teacher, they cooperated with and supported each other, creating a brand-new, positive classroom atmosphere. But of course, none of this had anything to do with Yuyang, although, from a certain perspective, it did seem linked to her. When it was time for Section Three to go on stage, everyone stood up, emptying all the seats but two, one of them occupied by Sun Jianqiang, the other by Yuyang. She was not prepared for that. Even Sun, normally thick-skinned, could not hold his head up. His neck went limp and his head fell forward, his ears reddening. Yuyang looked up only once during the performance and saw little but Sun's red ears. She, too, could no longer hold her head up, for everyone at the school, including Chu Tian, must have seen that she, Wang Yuyang, was not qualified to celebrate 12-9. It was a public humiliation, a display of disgrace. Keeping her head between her knees, she kept scratching the ground with her fingernail, but she had no idea what she was writing or sketching. Maybe she was trying to dig a hole so she could crawl into it and cover herself with dirt. She felt like crying, but lacked even the courage to do that; fortunately she managed to hold back her tears, since crying under these circumstances would have been an even greater loss of face. What would the homeroom teacher think of her then?
Zhao Shanshan was engaged in a flurry of activities. After she applied her makeup, her sparkling eyes were beyond description. Looking at Zhao from a distance, Pang Fenghua had an anxiety attack, and she was incredulous when Zhao walked up and offered to make Fenghua's eyebrows longer. When was the last time Zhao had even acknowledged her presence? But Zhao was for real, for she'd already raised Pang's chin and was elongating her eyebrows all the way over to her temples.
Zhao then redrew Pang's lip lines to make her mouth smaller and show off its outline. After changing the color of Fenghua's eye shadow, Zhao held up a small mirror for Pang to see how she looked.
"Silly girl, see how pretty you are."
Pang glanced away and spotted the homeroom teacher, who was gazing attentively in their direction. Still caught up in her low self-esteem, Fenghua said, "Shanshan, we country girls can never get rid of our country look."
Zhao rapped Pang's head with her knuckles, which hurt; it was as if only pain could help her explain what she wanted to say.
"How could you be a country girl? What makes you think that? Just look at you. You have such good qualities."
Zhao's earnest words entered Fenghua's ears and went straight to her heart. She was deeply moved. Fenghua had always been concerned that she looked like a country girl, but everything was fine now that an authoritative description of her had been formed.
She was so emotional she felt a need to repay Zhao's kindness, but before she could say anything, Zhao gave her a kind reminder: "When we're on stage, don't wait for me to nod to you. You have to give me the signal, all right? Remember, you're the conductor."
Pang just stared at Shanshan and, with a sudden sadness rising up, wrapped her arms around the girl's waist. "Shanshan, I've been so jealous of you, but I promise I won't be any longer. I mean it. Let's be sisters." Shanshan knew she meant it.
Knowing that people tend to degrade themselves in the grip of emotion, Shanshan still did not like what she was hearing. Fenghua was flattering herself. How dare she claim to be my sister. Who does she think she is?
Shanshan turned and saw that the homeroom teacher was watching her. This time he looked away before she did. Turning back, she took Fenghua's hands and said, "It's our turn." Feeling a bit lost, Pang stared straight ahead, a blank look on her face. But she was convinced that a friendship between Shanshan and herself had taken hold. There had been, she thought, a definite improvement in their relationship. Now she was an integral member of
Shanshan's group.
Section Three did not just win; it scored a resounding victory with a huge lead over the class that came in second. When Shanshan went onstage to receive the award, the homeroom teacher signaled his approval with a tilt of his chin. He was the first to applaud. Except for Sun Jianqiang and Wang Yuyang, everyone in Section Three was bathed in a holiday mood. Luckily those two were overlooked, since the others were too happy to be reminded of them. Why would they give them even a passing thought? The homeroom teacher did not have to say or do anything for the students to know how he felt about their accomplishment.
They weren't children, after all. Taking advantage of the happy moment, Shanshan dragged Fenghua over to the homeroom teacher's dorm room that evening. Fenghua, who hadn't wanted to go, stood hand in hand with Shanshan outside his room, wearing a stylish red hairclip that was a gift from Shanshan.
The teacher was happy to see them and had plums ready as a treat, as if he'd known they'd come. "You've done well," he said, drawing a bashful smile from Shanshan, who was sitting on the bed next to Fenghua, still holding her hand.
The teacher lit a cigarette, but he looked like a new smoker as he puffed on it in an awkward, exaggerated manner. But that did not stop him from chattering away; in fact, he all but monopolized the conversation. His Misty Poetry-style of talking was replaced by plain everyday conversation that was easily understood by both girls. That went on for five or six minutes before Shanshan jumped to her feet, suddenly reminded of something urgent. Fenghua stood to leave with her, but Shanshan said, "You stay. I just remembered that someone's waiting for me." A note of self-reproach crept into her voice.