Life and Death are Wearing Me Out (33 page)

“Number sixteen! My god! Our old sow has produced a litter of sixteen piglets!”

I blinked to clear the mucus out of my eyes. I didn’t need to look at myself to know that I’d come back as a pig this time, and that all those squirming, squealing lumps of flesh were my brothers and sisters. I knew what I must look like, and I was furious over how back-stabbing Lord Yama had fooled me again. How I loathed pigs, those filthy beasts. I’d have been fine with coming back as another donkey or an ox, but not a pig, condemned to roll around in the muck and mud. I’ll starve myself, that’s what I’ll do, so I can get back down to the underworld and settle accounts with that damned Lord Yama.

It was a sweltering summer day, by my calculations — the sunflowers beyond the pigpen wall hadn’t yet bloomed, though the leaves were big and plump — sometime during the sixth lunar month. There were flies everywhere and dragonflies circling the air high above me. I felt my legs growing strong and my eyesight improving fast. I saw the two people who had been standing by when the sow had her litter: one was Huang Tong’s older daughter, Huzhu, the other my son, Ximen Jinlong. My skin tightened at the sight of my son’s familiar face, and my head began to ache; it was almost as if a huge human form, or a crazed spirit, were confined in my tiny piglet body. Suffocating, I’m suffocating! Misery, oh, such misery! Let me go, let me spread out, let me slough off this filthy, abominable pig shell, to grow and regain the manly form of Ximen Nao! But of course, none of that was possible. I fought like mad, but still wound up in the palm of Huang Huzhu. She tweaked my ear with her finger and said:

“Jinlong, this one seems to be having convulsions.”

“Who cares? The old sow doesn’t have enough teats as it is, so let’s hope a few die,” he said venomously.

“No, they’re all going to live.” Huzhu put me down and wiped me clean with a soft red cloth. She was so gentle. It felt wonderful. Without meaning to, I squealed, that damned pig sound.

“Did she have her litter? How many?” That voice was outside the pigpen, loud and very familiar. I shut my eyes in total despair. I not only recognized Hong Taiyue’s voice I could even tell he’d regained his official post. Lord Yama, oh, Lord Yama, all those fine words about being reborn as the pampered son of a high official in a foreign country, when all along you meant to fling me into a Ximen Village pigpen. You tricked me, you shameless, backbiting liar! I fought to free myself from Huzhu’s hands and landed on the ground with a thud. A single squeal, and I passed out.

When I came to, I was lying in a bed of leaves, bright sunlight filtering down through the branches of an apricot tree. The smell of iodine was in the air; shiny ampoules were strewn on the ground around me. My ears were sore, so was my rump, and I knew they’d brought me back from the verge of death. All of a sudden, a lovely face materialized in my head, and I knew she was the one who’d given me the shots; yes, it was her, my daughter, Ximen Baofeng. Trained as a people doctor, she often treated sick animals as well. Dressed in a blue-checked, short-sleeved shirt, she seemed worried about something. But she always looked like that. She tweaked my ear with her cold finger and said to the person next to her:

“He’s okay now, you can take him back to the pen to suckle.”

Hong Taiyue rushed up and rubbed my silky skin with his coarse hand.

“Baofeng,” he said, “don’t think that treating a pig is unworthy of your talent!”

“The thought never occurred to me, Party secretary,” Baofeng replied matter-of-factly as she picked up her medical kit. “As far as I’m concerned, there’s no difference between animals and humans.”

“I’m glad to hear that,” Hong said. “Chairman Mao has called upon people to raise pigs. Raising pigs is a political act, and by doing a good job at it you’re showing your loyalty to Chairman Mao. Do you understand what I’m saying, Jinlong and Huzhu?”

Huzhu said yes, but Jinlong leaned against the apricot tree, smoking a cheap cigarette.

“I asked you a question, Jinlong,” Hong said, obviously displeased.

Jinlong cocked his head. “I’m listening, aren’t I?” he said. “Would you like me to recite the entirety of Chairman Mao’s supreme directive on raising pigs?”

“Jinlong,” Hong said as he stroked my back, “I know you’re upset, but keep in mind that Li Renshun of Taiping Village wrapped a fish in a newspaper with Chairman Mao’s image, and was sentenced to eight years. He is undergoing labor reform as I speak. Your problem is far worse than his!”

“Mine was unintentional, and that’s the difference.”

“If yours had been intentional, you’d have been shot,” Hong replied, his anger rising. “Do you know why I protected you?” He looked over at Huzhu. “Partly because Huzhu and your mother got down on their knees and begged me. But the main reason was that I know all about you. You come from bad stock, but grew up under the red flag and were the kind of youngster we wanted to foster in the period before the Cultural Revolution. You’re an educated youngster, a middle-school graduate, just what the revolution needs. Don’t think that raising pigs is unworthy of your talents. Under current circumstances, no job is more glorious or more arduous than raising pigs. By assigning you here, the Party is testing your attitude toward Chairman Mao’s revolutionary line!”

Jinlong flipped his cigarette away, stood up straight, and bowed his head to receive Hong Taiyue’s reprimand.

“You two are lucky — but since the proletariat frowns on luck, let’s talk about circumstances.” Hong raised his hand, with me in it, into the air. “Our village sow has produced a litter of sixteen piglets, a rarity anywhere in the province. The county government happens to be looking for a pig-raising model right now.” He lowered his voice and said with a hint of mystery, “A model, know what I’m saying? You know the meaning of the word, don’t you? The rice paddies at Dazhai are a model. The oil fields at Daqing are a model. The fruit orchards at Xiadingjia are a model. Even the dances for old ladies organized at Xujiazhai are a model. So why can’t the pig farms of Ximen Village be a model? Lan Jinlong, you put on a model opera a few years back, didn’t you? You brought Jiefang and your dad’s ox into the commune, didn’t you? Weren’t you trying to create models?”

Jinlong looked up, eyes flashing. How well I knew the temperament of that son of mine, how his sharp mind turned out outstanding ideas that would amount to what today might be seen as absurd, but at the time were enthusiastically praised.

“I’m getting old,” Hong said, “and now that I’ve been given a second chance, all I hope for is to do a decent job with village affairs and be worthy of the trust of the masses and my superiors. But the prospects for you young people are unlimited. So long as you do your best, you’ll get credit for your successes, and if problems arise, I’ll take the responsibility.” Hong pointed at the commune members digging ditches and building walls in the apricot grove. “A month from now there’ll be two hundred garden-style pigpens out there, with a goal of five pigs for every person. The more pigs we raise, the more fertilizer we’ll get and the greater the harvests we’ll bring in. Grain rolls in, worries fade out; ditches deep, grain stores vast. No more hegemony, only support for worldwide revolution. Every pig is a bomb flung into the midst of the imperialists, revisionists, and reactionaries. So this old sow of ours, with her litter of sixteen piglets, has presented us with sixteen bombs. The old sows are aircraft carriers that will launch all-out attacks against the world’s imperialists, revisionists, and reactionaries. By now you two ought to understand the importance of assigning you to this post.”

I kept my eyes on Jinlong as I listened to this grandiose speech by Hong Taiyue. Now that I’d undergone several rebirths, our father-son relationship had weakened, until it was little more than a faint memory, a few words inscribed on a family register. Hong Taiyue’s speech acted on Jinlong like a powerful stimulant, setting his mind in motion and his heart pumping; he was itching to get started. Rubbing his hands excitedly, he walked up to Hong, cheeks twitching, big, thin ears quivering, and I readied myself for the familiar prolonged monologue that was forthcoming — but this time I was wrong, there was no monologue; a series of setbacks in life had obviously matured him. He took me from Hong Taiyue and held me so close I could feel his heart pound. He bent down and kissed me on the ear. That kiss would one day become a significant detail in the glorified dossier of model pig farmer Lan Jinlong: “Lan Jinlong performed mouth-to-mouth resuscitation in a life-saving attempt on a newborn piglet, snatching the piglet with the purple splotches from the jaws of death. The piglet heralded its salvation with piggish squeals. But Lan Jinlong, enervated by the effort, passed out in the pigpen after uttering resolutely:

“‘Party Secretary Hong, from this day forward, all boars are my father, and all sows are my mother!’”

“That’s what I like to hear!” Hong said joyfully. “Young people who view our pigs as their mothers and fathers are exactly what we need.”

Despite all the grandiose treatment bestowed upon the pigs by the fanatical people, a pig was still a pig. They could have showered me with all the love they had, but I was dead set on starving myself right out of this pig existence. I wanted another audience with Lord Yama, where I would make a scene, claiming my right to be human and demanding a rebirth I could be proud of.

By the time they returned me to the pigpen, the old sow was lying on her side, legs stretched out on a bed of hay as a row of piglets squeezed up to her exposed teats. They were sucking greedily and noisily. The unfortunate ones left out were shrieking their displeasure and trying to force their way in among their brothers and sisters. Some made it, forcing others out, while some others climbed up on top of the sow to jump up and down and raise a stink. The old sow lay there grunting, eyes closed, and all I felt were pity and loathing.

After handing me to Huzhu, Jinlong bent down and pulled one of the sucking piglets away from its teat, but not before it stretched it out like a rubber band. Another little pig filled the vacuum. So Jinlong pulled all those greedy little pigs away and put them outside the pen, where they protested ineffectually. Now only ten remained stuck to the sow’s belly, exposing a pair of usable teats. Both were red, puffy, and disgusting, thanks to the previous users. Picking me up from Huzhu, Jinlong put me down by the sow’s belly. I shut my eyes, which made me disgustingly conscious of the sucking sounds from my repulsive brothers and sisters. I’d have thrown up if I’d had anything in my stomach. You already know I wanted to die, so there was no way I was going to put one of those filthy teats in my mouth. I knew that the day I started sucking nonhuman milk was the day I’d give up half my humanity and sink forever into the abyss of the animal kingdom. The minute I put my mouth around that sow’s teats, I’d be seized by pig-ness. A pig’s temperament, a pig’s interests and concerns, and a pig’s desires would flow with her milk and course through my veins, transforming me into a swine that retained a mere smidgeon of human memories, thus completing a filthy and shameful reincarnation.

“Go on, drink up!” Jinlong positioned me so my mouth was up against a very plump teat, and when the saliva smeared on the nipple by my siblings touched my lips, I nearly puked. I kept my mouth tightly shut and my teeth clenched to avoid temptation.

‘What a stupid pig. It doesn’t have the sense to open its mouth when there’s a teat right in front of it.” Jinlong whacked me on the rump to underscore his comment.

“Don’t be so rough on him,” Huzhu complained as she pushed Jinlong away and pulled me up to her, where she gently rubbed my belly. I sort of purred, it felt so good, I couldn’t help it, though it was really a pig noise of contentment, but not that hard on the ears. Huzhu murmured, “You precious thing, foolish little piglet sixteen, your mother’s milk is really good, just taste it. You have to eat to grow up.” Thanks to her mutterings, I learned that I was the sixteenth piglet in a litter of sixteen, in other words, the last one out of the old sow’s belly. In spite of my extraordinary experiences in the worlds of light and darkness, that is, life and death, my knowledge of human and animal existences, in the eyes of the people, I was a pig, that’s all. A crushing tragedy; but even greater tragedies lay ahead.

Huzhu brushed the sow’s teat against my lips and nose, and that tickled my nose. I sneezed. That surprised her, I felt that in the way her hand jerked. Then she laughed. “I’ve never heard a pig sneeze before,” she said. “Sixteen, Piglet Sixteen, since you can sneeze, you ought to be able to eat.” She grabbed hold of the teat and squirted a warm liquid onto my lips. I licked it tentatively. Yow! My god! I never would have believed that a sow’s milk, my mother sow’s milk, could be so delicious, so fragrant, like silk, like love itself, so wonderful it made me forget the humiliation of being reborn as a pig and completely changed my impression of my surroundings, so glorious I couldn’t help feeling that the pig mother lying on the crushed grass supplying milk for a litter of boy and girl piglets was a noble beast, sacred and pure, solemn and beautiful. Without further hesitation, I wrapped my lips around that nipple, nearly taking Huzhu’s finger along with it, and opened the flow of milk into my mouth and down to my stomach. With each minute, each second, I felt myself grow stronger, felt my love for my pig mother increase; I heard Huzhu and Jinlong clap their hands and laugh, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw their youthful faces glow like cockscomb flowers. They were holding hands, and that sent fragments of historical memory flashing through my head, all of which I wanted only to forget. I shut my eyes so I could concentrate on the joys of a baby pig at its mother’s teat.

Over the days that followed, I became the most tyrannical piglet in the litter. My appetite shocked Jinlong and Huzhu; I had a natural gift for eating. I was always able to unerringly find the teat with the most milk, outmaneuvering my dull-witted brothers and sisters, who closed their eyes as soon as they wrapped their lips around a teat, while my eyes were open from start to finish as I sucked madly on the biggest nipple and covered up the ones next to it with my body I vigilantly kept my eyes peeled, waiting for one of my pitiful siblings to come looking for a meal; I’d send him or her flying with a butt to the head. Then as soon as I’d sucked the big teat dry, I’d move to the next one.