Big Breasts and Wide Hips (44 page)

“Do you wish you were home, Little Uncle?” Sima Liang asked. The toasty brick bed, Mother's warm embrace, the nighttime wanderings of Big Mute and Little Mute, crickets in the oven platform, sweet goat's milk, the creaking of Mother's joints and her deep coughs, the silly laughter of First Sister out in the yard, the soft feathers of night owls, the sound of snakes catching mice behind the storeroom … how could I not with that? I sniffled. “Let's run away, Little Uncle,” he said. “How can we, with guards at the door?” I said softly. He grabbed my arm. “See this fir pole?” he said as he laid my hand on the pole that went all the way up to the roof. It was wet. “We can shinny up, make a hole in the sheet-metal roof, and wriggle out.” “What then?” I asked, unconvinced. “We jump to the ground,” he said. “After that, we go home.” I tried to picture us standing on the rusty, clattery sheet-metal roof, and felt my knees begin to knock. “It's too high,” I muttered. “We'd break a leg jumping down from there.” “Don't worry about it, Little Uncle, leave everything to me. I jumped down off this roof once this spring. There's a bunch of lilac bushes under the eaves. Their springy branches will break our fall.” I looked up at the spot where the pole met the sheet metal; rays of gray light shone through; bright water slithered down the pole. “It'll be light soon, Little Uncle. Let's go,” he urged anxiously. What could I do? I nodded.

“I'll go first and move the sheet metal out of the way,” he said as he patted me on the shoulder to show he had everything under control. “Give me a boost.” He wrapped his arms around the slippery pole, jumped up, and rested his feet on my shoulders. “Stand up,” he urged, “stand up!” With my arms around the pole, I stood up, my legs shaking. Rats clinging to the pole squeaked as they jumped to the floor. I felt him press down with his feet as he plastered himself up against the pole like a gecko. In the muted light seeping in, I watched him shinny up the pole, slipping back every once in a while, until he finally made it to the top.

There he hit the sheet metal with his fist, making loud clangs and letting more rainwater in. It landed on my face, some of it entering my mouth and leaving the bitter taste of rust, not to mention tiny metal filings. He was breathing hard in the dark and grunting from exertion. I heard the sheet metal shift as a cascade of water hit me, and I held tightly to the pole to keep from being swept off the millstone. Sima Liang pushed with his head to make the hole bigger. It strained for a moment before giving way, and a raggedy triangle opened up in the roof, through which beams of gray starlight streamed. Amid the stars in the sky, I spotted several that hardly shone at all. “Little Uncle,” he said from beyond the rafters, “wait there while I take a look around. Then I'll come down and help you up.” With an upward surge, he stuck his head up through the new skylight to look around.

“Somebody's on the roof!” a soldier at the gate shouted. Bright tongues of light split the darkness as bullets ricocheted off the sheet metal with loud pings. Sima Liang slid down the pole so fast he nearly flattened me. He wiped the water from his face and spat out a mouthful of metal filings. His teeth were chattering. “It's freezing up there!”

The deep darkness just before dawn had passed, and the inside of the mill house began to turn light. Sima Liang and I were huddled together; I could feel his heart beating fast against my ribs, like a feverish sparrow. I was weeping out of despair. Brushing my chin with the top of his nice, round head, he said, “Don't cry, Little Uncle, they won't dare hurt you. Your fifth brother-in-law is their superior officer.”

There was now enough light to get a good look at our surroundings. The twelve enormous millstones, one of which Sima Liang and I occupied, shimmered majestically. His uncle, Sima Ting, occupied another. Water dripped from the tip of his nose as he winked at us. Wet rats covered the tops of the other millstones, huddled together, their beady little eyes a glossy black, their tails like worms. They looked pitiful and loathsome at the same time. Water puddled on the floor and dripped in through the roof. The soldiers of the Sima Battalion stood in tight little groups, their green uniforms, now black, sticking to their bodies. The looks in their eyes and the expressions on their faces were terrifyingly similar to those on the rats. For the most part, the civilian prisoners were off by themselves, only a few choosing to mix with the soldiers, like the occasional stalk of wheat in a cornfield. There were more men than women, some of whom held whimpering children in their arms. The women sat on the floor; most of the men were on their haunches, except for a few who leaned against the walls. Those walls had been whitewashed at one time, but now that they were wet, the plaster rubbed off on the men's backs, changing their color. I spotted the cross-eyed girl in the crowd. She was sitting in the mud with her legs out in front, leaning against another woman. Her head was lolling against her shoulder, as if her neck were broken. Old Jin, the woman with one breast, was sitting on the buttocks of a man. Who was he? He was sprawled in the water, facedown, white whiskers floating on the surface, clots of black blood shifting in the water around them like little tadpoles. Only Old Jin's right breast ever developed; the left side of her chest was flat as a whetstone, which made the one breast seem to stick up higher than normal, like a lonely hill on the plains. The nipple was big and hard, nearly bursting through her thin blouse. People called her “Oilcan,” since they said that whenever her nipple was aroused, you could hang an oilcan from it. Decades later, when I finally had the chance to lie atop her naked body, I noticed that the only sign of a breast on her left side was a little nipple the size of a bean, like a mole announcing its existence. She was sitting on the dead man's buttocks, rubbing her face, as if deranged; she'd rub her face, and then rub her hands on her knees, as if she had just crawled out of a spider hole and was tearing translucent cobwebs off her face. The other people were in a variety of postures and attitudes. Some were crying, others were laughing, while still others were mumbling with their eyes shut. One woman was rocking her head back and forth, like a water snake or a crane at water's edge. Married to Geng Da'le, the shrimp paste seller, she had a long neck and a small head, much too small for her body. People said she was a transformed snake, and her head sure looked like it. It stuck up out of a group of women whose heads all hung forward, and in the dank coldness of the mill house, with its muted light, the way her head swayed back and forth was all the proof I needed that she'd once been a snake and was now turning back into one. I didn't have the nerve to go take a look at her body, but even when I forced myself to look away, her image stayed with me.

A lemon-colored snake slithered down one of the China fir poles. It had a flat head like a spatula and a purple tongue that kept darting in and out of its mouth. Each time its head touched the top of the millstone, it went limp, turned a right angle, and slithered off in a new direction, heading straight for rats in the center of the millstone. The rats raised their claws amid a frenzy of squeaks. As the snake's head moved in a straight line, its thick body slithered smoothly down the pole, uncoiling as it went, as if the pole and not the snake were turning. When it reached the center of the millstone, the head abruptly rose at least a foot into the air and leaned backward, like a hand. The spot behind its head contorted, flattened out and widened, displaying a latticework pattern. The movement of the purple tongue quickened, a horrifying sight accompanied by a bone-chilling hiss. The rats made themselves as small as possible, squeaking all the while. One large rat stood up on its hind legs and bared its claws, like holding a book, then shifted its rear legs before leaping into the air, straight into the triangular opening of the snake's mouth. The snake closed its mouth, leaving the back half of the rat sticking out straight, its rigid tail still waving comically.

Sima Ku was sitting on an abandoned China fir pole, his head sagging onto his chest, his hair in total disarray. Second Sister lay across his knees, her head cradled in the crook of his arm, face-up, the skin of her neck pulled taut. Her mouth hung slack, a black hole in her ghostly white face. Second Sister was dead. Babbitt was sitting close to Sima Ku; his young face had the look of an old man. The upper half of Sixth Sister's body lay across Babbitt's knees, and it never stopped twitching. Babbitt stroked her shoulders with a hand made puffy by all the rain. Behind the decrepit gate, a skinny man was preparing to kill himself. His trousers had fallen down to his thighs, revealing underpants that were soiled by mud. He wanted to tie his cotton belt to the top of the doorframe, but couldn't reach that high, even when he jumped; he was so weak he barely left the ground. I saw by the way the back of his head protruded that it was Sima Liang's uncle, Sima Ting. Finally, too exhausted to try any longer, he reached down, pulled up his trousers, and retied his belt around his waist. He turned and gave the crowd of onlookers an embarrassed smile before plopping down in the mud and beginning to sob.

The morning winds blew in from the fields, like a wet cat with a glistening carp in its mouth, prowling arrogantly on the sheet-metal roof. The red morning sun climbed out of the hollows, filled with rainwater, dripping wet and exhausted. The Flood Dragon River was at flood stage, the crashing of its waves louder than ever in the morning quiet. We were sitting on the millstone, where our gaze was met by misty red sunbeams. The glass in the windows was spotless after a night of unremitting rain; August fields, obstructed by neither the building's roof nor trees, were right there in front of our eyes. Outside, the flow of rainwater had washed the street clean of dust and exposed the hard chestnut-colored ground below. The surface of the street shimmered as if varnished; a pair of not quite dead striped carp lay in the street, tails still flapping weakly. A couple of men in gray uniforms — one tall, the other short; the tall one skinny, the short one fat — were staggering down the street carrying a big bamboo basket filled with a dozen or more big fish, including striped carp, grass carp, even a silvery eel. Excited by the sight of the two fish on the street, they ran over — stumbled, actually, like a crane and a duck tied together. “Big carp!” the short, fat one said. “Two of them!” the tall, skinny one said. I could nearly make out their faces as they bent down to scoop up the fish, and I was pretty sure they were two waiters from the banquet after Sixth Sister and Babbitt's wedding, a couple of planted agents from the 16th Battalion. The men standing guard at the mill house watched them scoop up the fish. The platoon leader yawned as he walked up to the men. “Fat Liu and Skinny Hou, this is what's called finding balls in your pants and landing fish on dry ground.” “Platoon Leader Ma,” Skinny Hou said, “it's a tough assignment.” “Not really, but I am hungry,” Platoon Leader Ma replied. Fat Liu said, “Come over for some fish soup. A victory like ours deserves a reward of good food and drink for the soldiers.” Platoon Leader Ma said, “You'll be lucky if those few fish are enough for you cooks, let alone the soldiers.” “You're an officer, whatever your rank,” Skinny Hou said. “And officers need to back up what they say with proof, they must temper their criticisms with political necessities. There is no room for irresponsible talk.” “I was just joking. Don't take everything so serious!” “Skinny Hou,” Platoon Leader Ma said, “in the few months since I last saw you, you've picked up the gift of gab!”

While they were squabbling, Mother walked slowly and heavily, but with determination, toward us, a red sunset at her back. “Mother —” I sobbed as I jumped down off the millstone. I wished I could have flown into her arms, but I slipped and fell in the mud at the foot of the millstone.

When I came to my senses again, the first thing I saw was Sixth Sister's agitated face. Sima Ku, Sima Ting, Babbitt, and Sima Liang were all standing beside me. “Mother's here,” I said to Sixth Sister. “I saw her with my own eyes.” I struggled out of Sixth Sister's grasp and ran toward the door, where I bumped into someone's shoulder. That rocked me for a moment, but then I took off again, cutting through the crowds of people. The gate stopped me. Pounding it with my fists, I cried out, “Mother — Mother —!”

A soldier stuck the black muzzle of his tommy gun in through a hole in the gate. “Pipe down! We'll let you out after breakfast.”

Mother heard my shouts and began walking faster. She waded across the ditch at the side of the road and headed straight for the mill house. Platoon Leader Ma stopped her. “That's far enough, elder sister!”

But Mother reached up, pushed him out of the way, and kept walking without a word. Her face was encased in the red light, as if smeared with blood; her mouth was twisted in anger.

The guards quickly closed ranks, forming a line like a black wall.

“Stop right there, old lady!” Platoon Leader Ma ordered as he grabbed Mother's arm and would not let her proceed any farther. Mother strained to break his grip. “Who are you, and what do you think you're doing?” Platoon Leader Ma asked angrily. He jerked her backward, nearly causing her to fall.

“Mother!” I cried through the door.

Mother's eyes turned blue and her twisted mouth flew open, releasing a series of grunts. She broke for the door with no thought for anything else. But Platoon Leader Ma shoved her from behind, knocking her into the roadside ditch. Water splashed in all directions. Mother rolled once in the water and clambered to her knees. The water reached her navel. She crawled out of the ditch, drenched, muddy bubbles clinging to her hair. She'd lost one of her shoes, but hobbled forward on crippled bound feet.

“I said stop right there!” Platoon Leader Ma cocked his tommy gun and aimed it at her chest. “Are you trying to incite a jailbreak?” he fumed.

“Get out of my way!”