Leave Me Alone (19 page)

‘Is it really you?’ I exclaimed.

Pang Yuyan blushed and in the twinkling of an eye she fled through the wall of people and disappeared, just like twenty years ago when dressed in all her finery she’d burst from the room where I’d had my sexual initiation and giggled to Lang Four, ‘Baby Rabbit is really a tender chicken.’ After that she’d ran off embarrassed, leaving me not knowing whether to laugh or cry.

That afternoon, bathed in the bright sunlight of Chengdu, I asked myself bemusedly who it was who had been witness to this key moment of my youth. Was it the slim vivacious girl or this foul-mouthed harridan?

Bighead Wang supposed that I was thinking of Zhao Yue. His face disdainful, he said, ‘How come you’re acting like a young girl? Divorced is divorced. Start looking for someone else!’

‘Fuck off. Just drink and shut up,’ I replied.

Bighead Wang drained his glass in one gulp, then seemed to remember something he wanted to ask me.

‘Did you know that Li Liang…’ he started. But then the girls came squeezing past us again and Bighead Wang immediately stopped talking and stared at them instead. One girl pressed her chest against me as she nudged past, and it was soft with a warm fragrance.

After they’d gone, I said bad-temperedly, ‘Li Liang what? Hurry up and tell me.’

He ordered another beer, then said softly, ‘Did you know that Li Liang is on smack?’

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

In our final term at university, our campus was seized with a fin de siècle craziness. Sweethearts faced with approaching separation smiled like spring flowers or cried like rain. No one was willing to let these final moments slip away as they worked out their final passions on their lovers’ bodies. The woods around our campus were strewn with condoms. Everyone’s directions had been set; the future wound away into the distance; happy expressions concealed our anxiety. Bighead Wang spent all his days sunk in drink, while Big Brother rode his bicycle into town each afternoon to watch porn films.

We neglected Li Liang though. After his third unsuccessful relationship he’d become unusually dejected and had even given up studying. Every day he played mahjong, his hair dishevelled, his face unwashed, squandering his allowance,
running up debts. Several times I tried to give him advice, but he was very negative and wouldn’t listen.

‘Fuck it, why can’t you change the subject?’ he’d say.

One night, after lights out, Big Brother was providing his customary blow-by-blow account of the porn movies he’d seen that day. Our minds exploded as he vividly described luscious girls in every kind of position, doing oral, anal, etc. After a while, Chen Chao couldn’t control himself any longer. With a loud cry he leapt from his bed, grabbed a bucket and hurried to the wash room to douse himself in cold water. Two minutes later he was back.

‘Chen Zhong, come quick. Li Liang…’ he called from the doorway.

We were one month from graduation. Qi Yan was already dead; we’d helplessly watched her life drain away. Number Six dorm’s Zhang Jun had long since become dust, the moonlight coldly illuminating his empty bed. As I raced along the long, gloomy corridor, I had a bad feeling about this, and then I found Li Liang slumped against the cistern, not moving. His head lolled on his chest. His toothbrush and soap had fallen to the ground and the tap was still running.

‘Li Liang, what’s up?’ I said.

He didn’t move. Chen Chao checked his breathing, then said with an ashen face, ‘Holy shit! Li Liang is dead.’

I hauled Li Liang up by his hands and feet and started dragging him. I was shitting myself because the body in my arms had no warmth, none. His limbs were rigid, there was no heartbeat and no sign of breathing.

With great difficulty we got him back to the dorm, where we tried to revive him. Big Brother helped me heave Li Liang onto the bed and we looked at each other in panic.

That was the first time. Later, at a small restaurant outside the school, Li Liang passed out again; from that day on I had an intuition that Li Liang would die alone.

I hadn’t been to his house for ages. People were hypocrites, I thought: while the illusion was convenient they could be friends, but once reality surfaced they would fight tooth and claw. ‘Undying love’ between a man and woman sounded great; so did ‘eternal friendship’; but who knew what the person in your arms was really thinking when they were making those pledges of friendship or love?

Bighead said that he’d seen Li Liang shoot up.

‘His arm is covered in track marks. It’s terrifying.’

He furrowed his brow. I was devastated, and furious with Bighead Wang for not telling me sooner. He said Li Liang wouldn’t let him.

‘You shouldn’t get involved,’ he added. ‘Li Liang himself said it’s the only pleasure he has left.’

Bighead was emotional and he hurled his beer glass to the floor. People at the surrounding tables stared at us alarmed.

‘Fuck you! What are you looking at?’ Bighead yelled.

When Li Liang wasn’t in the grip of his addiction, he appeared the same as usual. He listened to music, read books and studied the futures market on the internet.

‘Give it up,’ I told him. ‘Sleeping with whores or gambling
aren’t such a big deal, but once you get involved with drugs, there’s no way back.’

He hit a key to change the screensaver on his computer, then said, ‘You know why Ye Mei slept with you?’

I lowered my head. ‘I did wrong. Don’t bring it up again.’

He swung round to face me.

‘It’s not all your fault,’ he said. ‘You see, I can’t get it up.’

Although I had suspected it, for ages I couldn’t say anything.

He turned back to his computer, saying calmly, ‘I’ve had this problem for more than ten years; it’s ok. Yesterday I called Chen Chao and told him straight out: my little brother is on strike.’

I felt terrible for him. Awkwardly I asked whether he’d sought medical help.

‘It’s no good,’ he said. ‘When I was small, my father kicked me and that caused the problem.’

He paced behind my back, laughing crudely. ‘You know, Chen Zhong, that day I desperately wanted to do the same to you.’

That first day at university, Li Liang was the last of our dormitory crew to show up. The Sichuan hall monitor was concerned; he told us that our floor should have another Sichuan student and we should take care of him. That night at twelve, Li Liang knocked lightly on the door and said in a strong Sichuan accent: ‘Fellow students, please open the door. I’m down for this dormitory too.’

Suppressing our mirth at his formal diction, we opened the door to let him in. Li Liang wore a pair of grey trousers and carried an enormous travel bag. His face had a slightly shy expression. Bighead Wang was asleep and snoring like thunder, a fat hand across his stomach. Chen Zhong was wearing just undershorts as he shook Li Liang’s hand. On the 15th of September that year, as far as I remember, there was no war. Nobody famous died. A few babies were born and, on their first sight of the world, began to cry loudly. No one knew how their lives would turn out, but it is said we are all spirits from heaven.

Trying to persuade Li Liang to quit smack was impossible. He was well aware of all the logical arguments, and always circumvented them by cutting directly to the ultimate question: ‘If you only had one month to live, would you do drugs or not?’

I thought about it seriously, then had to admit, yes, I would.

He smiled. ‘In my view, there’s not much difference between one month and ten years. Life shouldn’t be a test that you copy out over and over again. Do you understand?’

‘I’m confused,’ I said. ‘All I know is that smack is bad for you. Haven’t you seen those addicts? They all look like ghouls.’

He dragged me before a mirror and then he said, ‘Look at yourself.’

Yes, he had a point. I was emaciated. My face was pallid,
my hair dishevelled. My eyes were red and puffy, and there were hairs growing from my nose. I didn’t know when the corners of my eyes had got those lines. On one side of my nose were two black spots like fly shit.

‘Look at yourself,’ Li Liang said, ‘You look like a ghoul, don’t you?’

When I left, he said to me, ‘Tell Ye Mei. She can have a divorce, but she can’t have a cent of my money.’

‘You should tell her yourself,’ I said. ‘I’ll never see her again after today.’

He studied me coldly then said, ‘Fuck you. She only cares about you now.’

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Liu Three and Zhou Weidong came to blows. I was having an afternoon nap in the office when through my sleep I heard this huge racket. Pushing open the door, I encountered a crowd of people. Liu Three was pacing tensely, the veins on his temples were pulsing. Several people were trying to restrain Zhou Weidong, as his hands and feet flailed, and saliva sprayed grotesquely from his mouth. He declared that he wanted to have carnal relations with Liu Three’s mother. Fatty Dong threw his weight around and pleaded with Zhou Weidong to calm down. Zhou Weidong wouldn’t listen, which made Fatty furious. He noticed me. ‘These are all in your team, you should be managing this.’

I replied tartly, ‘Isn’t Liu Three your lackey? I’m not getting involved, let them go on fighting.’

Zhou Weidong was one metre seventy-eight of
intimidating might, so even two Liu Threes together couldn’t beat him up.

Fatty Dong looked grave. ‘Good, I’ve noted your attitude,’ he said, and clenching his jaw, marched into his office, presumably to write up a report.

I wasn’t scared of Fatty Dong then, because my hands were around his throat. On the day Head Office had issued its suggestions for handling my debt problem, we were having one of our regular meetings. The accountant passed the suggestions to Fatty Dong and the jerk was so enraged it seemed he might have an apoplexy. Throwing caution to the wind, he muttered that Head Office were all idiots, and then quipped sardonically to Liu Three: ‘Seems Head Office encourages the embezzlement of company money. You should borrow a few thousand too, and blow it on whores and gambling.’

‘Write down Boss Dong’s suggestions,’ I told Zhou Weidong.

The guy made a show of noting it down. Fatty Dong realised that he’d forgotten himself and his face turned pale.

Liu Three had been having a hard time lately. The week before I’d asked him to go to Chongqing to settle a bad account. It was a tough assignment and Liu Three pleaded that he didn’t want to go. I said, ‘If you don’t want to go then just hand in your resignation.’ He departed angrily. The value of the Chongqing disputed accounts was in the region of
400,000 or more, and they went back to the dawn of time, 1999. Since then the company had restructured its finance department several times so the accounts were in a real mess. No one could tell which were real and which were false.

Another difficulty was that the client had an unbelievably bad temper. If you said anything he didn’t like, his face immediately clouded over and then he’d explode. Liu Three also had a foul temper. He frequently got his ear bitten off for banging the desk in clients’ offices, and then would go crying to Fatty Dong for help, saying that I’d framed him.

As soon as Liu Three had left in the company car, I called the client and asked him to set up something to make Liu Three look bad.

‘No problem,’ he said. ‘I always thought that kid was an ugly bastard.’

When the client had visited Chengdu to experience ‘local culture’ he’d been extremely satisfied with the hospitality he’d received. Later he asked me to help him hook up with a girl he’d met before at the Jinjiang Hotel, called Bai Xiaowen or something. I could tell from his voice that he desperately wanted her in his arms again.

In ‘places of entertainment’ the girls very rarely used their own names, and sure enough I got a friend to investigate, and found there was no such person as Bai Xiaowen. Even her phone number and address were false. When I told him, the guy sounded surprisingly crushed.

‘Big Brother, this was just a one-off transaction,’ I told him. ‘Don’t mistake it for a long-term contract, OK?’

He laughed, and then invited me to Chongqing, saying
that the girls there were exceptionally hot. Underneath all the talk, I knew he was looking for a way to keep the disputed thousands. He was always calling to query the account and generally behaving unscrupulously; in short, he was a typical businessman.

When Liu Three returned, I showed him the client’s complaint form and asked him what we should do about it.

He looked at me superciliously and said, ‘You should go to Chongqing yourself and get the money back. Then if you want to fire me or cut my salary I’ll have no objection.’

I’d been to Chongqing numerous times and had plenty of experience of the hot girls, hotpot and hot pepper chicken dishes of Geleshan. Compared with Chengdu, Chongqing was down to earth but coarse, irreverent but edgy. A little while back, I was wandering the streets there when I heard a man and a woman talking.

‘Why are you walking so fast?’ the man said.

The girl replied, ‘I need to have a piss.’

I laughed when I saw the speaker — a fine-figured, beautiful girl.

That night I went to a nightclub and picked a girl who looked like the film star Gong Li. I groped her a few times and she wasn’t happy about it.

‘If you want to screw, then take off your trousers. If you want to sing, then sit still,’ she snapped at me. ‘What are you poking about for?’

I felt ashamed.

This time the client drove to the bus station to meet me. At his side was a girl who resembled a middle school student. I asked whether this was his daughter and he prickled and said it was his new lover. I almost vomited at the thought of that bulging stomach on top of that little girl’s body. This guy also had a violent side: once when we were at the Orchid Song Hall, a girl complained about his bad breath and he slapped her face and swore at her.

The most obvious change in me since university was that I didn’t get too worked up about things. In our dormitory, we’d come up with a list of the basic requirements to be a ‘real man’. Among these were: A real man must come to a woman’s defence. Big Brother had his own famous saying: Women are to use, not abuse. To hit a woman is unpardonable.

But because of money, I had to call this bastard a brother, and help him get women. When I thought about it, it really was disgraceful.

We had dinner at the Marriott where the abalone alone cost more than 400 yuan. In between courses Old Lai constantly criticised our company. He said our management was weak and our clients suffered. If we continued to provoke him, he wouldn’t do business with us anymore.

I said, ‘OK, if you want to lose 800,000 profit each year, I’ll find someone else.’

He was slightly thrown by my attitude. This was where I was more effective than Liu Three: I didn’t just know how to woo clients; I could menace them too when required. Call them ‘brother’ and needle them at the same time.

He nudged Young Lover, and the teenager poured me a
cup of five-grain alcohol. Her fingers were tapered, her skin white and tender. She looked sixteen at the most; her face was childish and still had an air of shy embarrassment. I couldn’t help feeling very sorry for her.

My own intentions were far from pure. Of the disputed 400,000 we had a fairly strong claim to about 120,000 which we definitely had to get back. As for the remaining 280,000 I wasn’t too bothered whether he gave it back or not, but he at least had to give me some. This guy was more corrupt than anyone, he should be able to guess what I was up to. The posturing was a bluff, to give him some leeway when discussing price. That was all. My ideal sum was 50,000, which would allow him to exchange 280,000 for 50,000. I didn’t like to imagine how many more young girls he could corrupt with those dishonest gains.

After dinner we went on to a teahouse. He sent Young Lover away and said to me lewdly, ‘How about her? Very tender, yeah?’

‘Be careful she’s not underage,’ I said, ‘otherwise you’ll go down for years.’

He laughed and then went straight to the main subject. ‘What are we going to do about that 400,000? You make a suggestion.’

I savoured a mouthful of fragrant maofeng, then smilingly kicked the ball back to him.

‘You first. You’re the one who’s been on me like a dog in heat for over a month. You must have some ideas.’

In recent years I’d fought hundreds of battles — with suppliers, sales agents, advertising companies, insurance
companies. I’d honed my negotiating skills, earning a reputation with clients for toughness. Often we’d negotiate for a while and then suddenly they’d exclaim: ‘How did I get screwed by you yet again!’

Actually, there were only two secrets to negotiating success. The first was to let the enemy go first. The second: at all costs disguise the cards in your hand.

My greatest success came when I was discussing replenishing our stock with the spare parts vendor on Scholar’s Cap Street. The boss was a thirty-something woman. After we’d signed the contract she almost cried, saying she’d never met anyone as ruthless as me and she’d need to work for a year to recover her losses. This woman was the voluptuous flower of Scholar’s Cap Street and her husband, twenty years older than her, was one of Chengdu’s first millionaires. I’d looked at her chest, thinking, If you weren’t so loyal to your husband, there’s no way I’d leave you feeling bad.

The client claimed our company’s accounts were a mess and that we’d issued duplicate bills so that the 400,000 was basically fictitious. He asked us to set things straight and write off the debt. I guffawed so violently, I nearly showered his face with tea.

‘Big brother, you must think I’m stupid,’ I said. ‘If it’s really as you say, then why are we sitting here?’

‘OK, so what do you suggest we do?’ he replied.

I produced a thick pile of documents. ‘Here’s all the hard evidence: 400,000 yuan and we want it all.’

He looked furious. ‘If you just want to fuck me and my family, forget it.’

I knew exactly how to play this game.

‘There’s nothing I can do,’ I told him. ‘You see, I’m just an employee. Not a penny of this money goes into my pocket, but I have an obligation to sort this out. You’re my big brother; you should show some understanding for your little brother.’

Now he was clear on my intentions. I drank tea and waited for his reaction. He muttered for a while, then asked me how much.

‘As a minimum you should repay the company 150,000,’ I said. ‘Of the remaining 250,000, whatever you say is OK.’

‘You’re clearly presenting me with a false bill,’ he said. ‘What 250,000? At the most it is six or seven thousand. Let’s have half each, OK?’

In what appeared to be a digression, I told him a story about the time when Old Sun and I went to Wenjiang sauna. Boss Sun decided to see what it was like to be an emperor and called for one tall and one short girl to come to his room. After negotiations he said he’d pay 1,000 all up, which he’d allocate according to the quality of their work. The tall girl was new and not very open. First, she was reluctant to take off her clothes, and then when Old Sun changed girls halfway through, she asked him to change condom. The old guy didn’t have any choice and, despite his curses, put on a new condom. He was about to re-enter the battle scene when he went limp and couldn’t get it up again, even with manual stimulation. He fiddled with it for ages, but there was no way the session could go on, which infuriated him. In the end, he gave the short girl the entire 1,000. The tall girl thought this unfair and told Old Sun.
Old Sun said, ‘You did nothing to satisfy me, so why should I help you to make money?’